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ISIS exploits US strikes to attack Iraqi forces in Anbar

The Cradle | February 3, 2024

The Iraqi army and the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMU) clashed with ISIS militants in western Anbar governorate on 3 February, an Iraqi security source told Al-Mayadeen.

The Iraqi Al-Nujaba satellite channel said that ISIS took advantage of the US bombing of targets in Iraq and Syria by launching an attack on the army and the PMU forces in the area of ​​Kilometer 160 on the Al-Sakkar highway near the town of Rutba in Anbar.

The US has occupied the nearby Al-Tanf Base on the Syrian side of the border since 2015 and has used it to arm and train ISIS militants.

The US and allied intelligence agencies used ISIS to attack the Syrian and Iraqi armies as part of its effort to effect regime change in Damascus starting in 2011 and to depose Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki in 2014.

After ISIS conquered large swathes of Iraq and Syria, US forces turned against the group. With help from Kurdish forces, the US took control of much of the territory in Syria ISIS once controlled. In Iraq, the US partnered with Iraqi forces to retake Mosul.

Gulf-backed Syria researcher Charles Lister wrote in Foreign Policy on 24 January that ISIS is enjoying a resurgence and that 10,000 ISIS militants are detained within at least 20 makeshift prisons in US and Kurdish-controlled northeastern Syria, constituting an ISIS “army in waiting” and its “next generation.”

The comments raised fears the US may use ISIS militants to counter forces from the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI), a coalition of Shia armed groups that seek to expel US forces from Syria and Iraq and end the Israeli genocide on Gaza.

February 3, 2024 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

US Vows Response to Deadly Attack on Mideast Base, Seeks to Avoid Wider Conflict

Sputnik – 29.01.2024

WASHINGTON – The United States will retaliate to a deadly drone attack on its al-Tanf military base on Syrian-Jordanian border at a time and in a manner of its choosing, but it is not seeking a wider conflict in the region, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said on Monday.

Earlier in the day, Axios reported that President Joe Biden discussed a “significant military response” to the attack during a meeting with top US officials on Sunday.

“As for our response options, the President is working his way through that right now. He had a good meeting yesterday with the National Security Team,” Kirby told CNN.

According to Axios, the White House and Pentagon are seeking to calibrate their retaliation to contain the risk of a wider conflict. Meanwhile, some hawks on Capitol Hill are pushing for strikes inside Iran, the report said.

“We will respond. We will do it in a time and a manner of our choosing. We’ll respond, you know, in a very consequential way but we don’t seek a war with Iran. We are not looking for a wider conflict in the Middle East,” Kirby said, when asked if the US is considering strikes inside Iran.

On Sunday, three US soldiers had been killed and 34 others injured in a drone attack on a US military base in Jordan’s northeast near the border with Syria.

President Biden pinned the blame on unspecified Iran-backed militant groups, while also saying the US was still gathering the facts. Jordanian cabinet spokesman Muhannad Mubaidin said that the strike targeted the US’s Al-Tanf base in Syria, not a base on Jordanian territory.

Iran has nothing to do with the drone attack on a US military base, Iranian state-run news agency IRNA reported, citing an Iranian official.

January 29, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Swarming’ the US in West Asia, until it folds

The US is so deeply mired in an unwinnable battle from the Levant to the Persian Gulf that only its adversaries in China, Russia, and Iran can bail it out.

By MK Bhadrakumar | The Cradle | January 29, 2024

Deterrence in defense is a military strategy where one power uses the threat of reprisal to preclude attack from an adversary, while maintaining at the same time the freedom of action and flexibility to respond to the full spectrum of challenges. In this realm, the Lebanese resistance, Hezbollah, is an outstanding example.

Hezbollah’s clarity of purpose in establishing and strictly maintaining ground rules that deter Israeli military aggression has set a high regional bar. Today, its West Asian allies have adopted similar strategies, which have multiplied in the context of the war in Gaza.

America, surrounded

While the Yemeni resistance movement Ansarallah is comparable to Hezbollah in certain respects, it is the audacious brand of defensive deterrence practiced by the Islamic Resistance of Iraq that is going to be highly consequential in the near term.

Last week, citing sources in the State Department and Pentagon, Foreign Policy magazine wrote that the White House is no longer interested in continuing the US military mission in Syria. The White House later denied this information, but the report is gaining ground.

The Turkish daily Hurriyet wrote on Friday that while Ankara is taking a cautious approach to media reports, it does see “a general striving” by Washington to exit not only Syria but the entire region of West Asia, as it senses that it has been dragged into a quagmire by Israel and Iran from the Red Sea to Pakistan.

Russia’s special presidential representative for the Syrian settlement, Alexander Lavrentiev, also told Tass on Friday that much depends on any “threat of physical impact” on American forces present in Syria. The swift US military exit from Afghanistan took place with virtually no advance notice, in coordination with the Taliban. “In all likelihood, the same may happen in Iraq and Syria,” Lavrentiev said.

Indeed, the Islamic Resistance of Iraq has stepped up its attacks on US military bases and targets. In a ballistic missile attack on Ain al-Asad airbase in western Iraq a week ago, an unknown number of American troops sustained injuries, and the White House announced its first troop deaths on Sunday when three US servicemen were killed on the Syrian-Jordanian border in strikes earlier that day.

Calling Beijing for help

This situation is untenable for President Joe Biden politically — in his re-election bid next November — which explains the urgency of the National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Friday and Saturday in Thailand to discuss the Ansarallah attacks in the Red Sea.

US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby explained Washington’s rush for Chinese mediation thus:

“China has influence over Tehran; they have influence in Iran. And they have the ability to have conversations with Iranian leaders that — that we can’t. What we’ve said repeatedly is: We would welcome a constructive role by China, using the influence and the access that we know they have…”

This is a dramatic turn of events. While the US has long been concerned about China’s growing sway in West Asia, it also needs that influence now as Washington’s efforts to reduce violence are getting nowhere. The US narrative on this will be that the “strategic, thoughtful conversation” between Sullivan and Wang will not only be “an important way to manage competition and tensions [between the US and China] responsibly” but also “set the direction of the relationship” on the whole.

Meanwhile, there has been hectic diplomatic traffic between Tehran, Ankara, and Moscow, as Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi traveled to Turkiye, and the moribund Astana format on Syria last week got kickstarted. Succinctly put, the three countries anticipate a “post-American” situation arising soon in Syria.

A US exit from Syria and Iraq?

Of course, the security dimensions are always tricky. On Friday, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad chaired a meeting in Damascus for commanders of the security apparatus in the army to formulate a plan for what lies ahead. A statement said the meeting drew up a comprehensive security roadmap that “aligns with strategic visions” to address international, regional, and domestic challenges and risks.

Certainly, what gives impetus to all this is the announcement in Washington and Baghdad on Thursday that the US and Iraq have agreed to start talks on the future of American military presence in Iraq with the aim of setting a timetable for a phased withdrawal of troops.

The Iraqi announcement said Baghdad aims to “formulate a specific and clear timetable that specifies the duration of the presence of international coalition advisors in Iraq” and to “initiate the gradual and deliberate reduction of its advisors on Iraqi soil,” eventually leading to the end of the coalition mission. Iraq is committed to ensuring the “safety of the international coalition’s advisors during the negotiation period in all parts of the country” and to “maintaining stability and preventing escalation.”

On the US side, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the discussions will take place within the ambit of a higher military commission established in August 2023 to negotiate the “transition to an enduring bilateral security partnership between Iraq and the United States.”

Pentagon commanders would be pinning hopes on protracted negotiations. The US is in a position to blackmail Iraq, which is obliged, per the one-sided agreement dictated by Washington during the occupation in 2003, to keep in the US banks all of Iraq’s oil export earnings.

But in the final analysis, President Biden’s political considerations in the election year will be the clincher. And that will depend on the calibration by West Asia’s resistance groups, and their ability to ‘swarm’ the US on multiple fronts until it caves. It is this ‘known unknown’ factor that explains the Astana format meeting of Russia, Iran, and Turkiye on January 24-25 in Kazakhstan. The three countries are preparing for the endgame in Syria. Not coincidentally, in a phone call last Friday, Biden once again told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “to scale down the Israeli military operation in Gaza, stressing he is not in it for a year of war,” Axios‘ Barak Ravid reported in a ‘scoop’.

Their joint statement after the Astana format meeting in Kazakhstan is a remarkable document predicated almost entirely on an end to the US occupation of Syria. It indirectly urges Washington to give up its support of terrorist groups and their affiliates “operating under different names in various parts of Syria” as part of attempts to create new realities on the ground, including illegitimate self-rule initiatives under the pretext of ‘combating terrorism.’ It demands an end to the US’ illegal seizure and transfer of oil resources “that should belong to Syria,” the unilateral US sanctions, and so on.

Simultaneously, at a meeting in Moscow on Wednesday between the Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev and Ali-Akbar Ahmadian, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, the latter reportedly stressed that Iran-Russia cooperation in the fight against terrorism “must continue, particularly in Syria.” Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to host a trilateral summit with his Turkish and Iranian counterparts to firm up a coordinated approach.

The Axis of Resistance: deterrence means stability

Iran’s patience has run out over the US military presence in Syria and Iraq following the revival of ISIS with American support. Interestingly, Israel no longer abides by its “de-confliction” mechanism with Russia in Syria. Clearly, there is close US-Israeli cooperation in Syria and Iraq at the intelligence and operational level, which goes against Russian and Iranian interests. Needless to say, the backdrop of the imminent upgrade of the Russia-Iran strategic partnership also needs to be factored in here.

These developments are a vintage illustration of defensive deterrence. The Axis of Resistance turns out to be the principal instrument of peace for the issues of security that entangle the US and Iran. Clearly, there isn’t any method or any reasonable hope of convergence to this process, but, fortunately, the appearance of chaos in West Asia is deceiving.

Beyond the distractions of partisan argument and diplomatic ritual, one can detect the outlines of a practical solution to the Syrian stalemate that addresses the inherent security interests of the US and Iran that are embedded within an outer ring of US-China concord over the situation in West Asia.

Russia may seem an outlier for the present, but there is something in it for everyone, as the pullout of US troops opens the pathway to a Syrian settlement, which remains a top priority for Moscow and for Putin personally.

January 29, 2024 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

American Base Near Syria-Jordan Border Attacked Amidst Rejection of US Role in Area

By John Miles – Sputnik – 28.01.2024

A US base near the Syria-Jordan border was struck by an overnight drone attack in the latest demonstration of widespread rejection of the United States’ role in the region.
The attack killed three US Army soldiers and injured more than 30, according to the latest reports from US officials Sunday.

There is dispute over whether the targeted US installation was in Jordan or Syria. US officials have claimed the attack hit Tower 22 in Jordan, which US media describes as a “small US outpost” in the northeast of the country. Meanwhile Jordanian government spokesman Muhannad al Mubaidin told a local television channel the strike was actually against the Al-Tanf base, which hosts a substantial US military presence in Syria.

The distinction is significant as the Syrian government and other countries consider the US presence in Syria to be illegal.

The instance is the first known time US troops have been killed in attacks targeting the country’s presence in the Middle East since US backing of Israel provoked retaliatory strikes starting in October. US strikes are thought to have produced casualties as recently as four days ago, when the White House reported that an attack on Kataib Hezbollah likely killed several members of the militia.

Although the United States has never formally declared war on Syria, the country has been involved in efforts to oust President Bashar al-Assad for more than a decade. Here, Sputnik takes a look at the controversial US role in the country, which has contributed to the death of at least half a million people.

Covert Operations

Many of the details surrounding the genesis of US presence in Syria are still shrouded in mystery. The intervention is thought to have begun in 2012 or 2013 as a classified program of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) known as Timber Sycamore. The program was launched by the agency’s infamous Special Activities Center, a division that conducts secret paramilitary activity, psychological operations, and economic warfare without oversight from the US public.

Launched at a time of mass US public opposition to unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, CIA officials hoped they could topple Syria’s government through the arming and training of rebel forces in the country. Ironically, many of the militants backed by the CIA had ties to ISIS, a force the United States has ostensibly fought to defeat in the region. This led former US President Donald Trump to claim former President Barack Obama was the “founder of ISIS.”

Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai has also claimed ISIS is a tool of US foreign policy, claiming he cannot distinguish between the United States and ISIS. Meanwhile Israel admitted in 2019 to arming ISIS-linked Syrian rebels in its shared desire with the US to eliminate al-Assad. Ex-US State Department official Michael Maloof has claimed US foreign policy in the Middle East is oriented around eliminating Israel’s enemies in Syria, Iran, and Libya, among other countries.

Hefty Pricetag

The CIA’s Timber Sycamore program is thought to be one of the most expensive efforts in the agency’s history. It’s been reported that more than $1 billion in weaponry has been sent to Syrian rebels, although the exact figure is not known. Thousands of tons of arms have been shipped from allied US countries.

The Al-Tanf base on the Syria-Jordan border is one of at least ten that the United States operates in Syria without the approval of the country’s government, which has ordered US forces to leave the country. Thousands of US troops have been stationed in the country and an unknown number of Special Operations Forces. The US military has worked to keep details of the US presence secret, and responded angrily when a Turkish news agency published a map of US installations.

US politicians have typically sold the US military presence as necessary to combat ISIS, despite the country’s cooperation with ISIS-linked Islamic radicals in the country. The United States has long sought to expand its presence in the oil-rich region more broadly, to the exclusion of others. The US has criticized the presence of Russian forces in the country, who assist Syria’s military at the invitation of the allied country’s government.

In a rare moment of candor of the type that earns him opposition from members of the US intelligence community, former US President Donald Trump once proclaimed the United States maintains a presence in Syria “only for oil.”

Legalities Be Damned

Many observers claim the American presence in Syria is contrary to US law and the so-called “rules-based order” often purportedly championed by the United States.

US Senator Rand Paul has sought to end the war, which he points out has never been declared by Congress in line with the US Constitution. The war’s backers insist US presidents have the authority to oversee action in Syria based on the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) which gives the executive branch broad latitude in the so-called “War on Terror.” Others say the AUMF itself is an unconstitutional abrogation of Congress’s defined constitutional powers.

“The United States cannot fix Syria,” said Robert Ford, Obama’s former ambassador to Syria, recently. “Yet we still have 900 troops in eastern Syria for eight years, going on nine. I’m puzzled that we haven’t had a national debate on what U.S. troops are doing in Syria.”

“We need to have that debate about the authorization of military force,” he added. “There needs to be a definition of the mission of U.S. forces. There needs to be a set of metrics to measure their success or failure.”

Given that the CIA’s intervention in the country may have begun without even informing the US president at the time, America’s decade-long presence in Syria raises questions about the sprawling US deep state’s lack of accountability.

January 29, 2024 Posted by | Deception, Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

US enlists extremists to attack Russian troops in Syria: Official

The Cradle | January 26, 2024

The Russian President’s Special Envoy to Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, has accused Washington of directing Syrian armed groups to carry out attacks against Russian troops in the country. 

“There are indications that the Americans are specifying tasks for their forces from among the Syrian armed opposition to inflict the greatest amount of damage on Russian military forces in Syria,” Lavrentiev said on 26 January. 

Lavrentiev added these attacks are planned not only against Russian forces in southern Syria but also in what is known as the Idlib de-escalation zone northwest of the country – patrolled by Russian and Turkish forces in line with a 2018 agreement. 

“[The US] has begun … supplying [extremist groups] with modern weapons and modern drones so that it can carry out raids, including on the Hmeimim base.” 

Hmeimim is a Russian-operated military base located southeast of the Syrian city of Latakia. Hostile, unidentified drones have approached the Hmeimim base in the past. 

On 3 October, Idlib-based extremists launched a drone towards a crowded military college in the city of Homs, killing dozens of civilians and graduating officers. 

Russian officials have repeatedly accused the US of harboring and training extremist militants in Syria, particularly inside Washington’s Al-Tanf military base. 

Russian and Syrian officials have also accused US forces of providing ISIS with logistical support and allowing it to operate from the 55-kilometer area surrounding the Al-Tanf base. 

Lavrentiev’s comments come as ISIS is making a resurgence in Syria. Despite losing the majority of its territory in the country, the group’s cells operate in the Syrian desert – geographically linked to Al-Tanf and the 55-kilometer zone around it – carrying out frequent hit and run attacks against Syrian troops, civilians, farmers, and truffle harvesters. 

This marked resurgence in ISIS activity coincides with ongoing attacks on US bases in Syria and Iraq by Iraqi resistance factions in support of Gaza and in rejection of US support for Israel. 

Since October, the Iraqi resistance has launched at least 153 attacks on the US bases.

US officials are reportedly also in talks to establish a time-table with the Iraqi government for a withdrawal of their troops from Iraq. 

However, sources told Reuters that the talks “are expected to take several months, if not longer, with the outcome unclear and no US troop withdrawal imminent.”

As US bases in Syria come under fire, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – a US-backed Kurdish militia which helps oversee Washington’s occupation of the country’s oilfields – has also been facing a widespread rebellion since last August, waged by Arab tribes with Syrian government backing. 

January 26, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

The U.S. Steals Syrian Oil, and the Kurds Sell It to Israel at a Discount in Erbil

By Steven Sahiounie | Strategic Culture Foundation | January 22, 2024

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRG) claimed responsibility for missile attacks on an Israeli “spy headquarters.” Kurdish businessman Peshraw Dizayee and four of his family members were killed in the attack on their home on January 16 near the U.S. Consulate in Erbil, in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region (IKR).

Dizayee was the owner of the Falcon Group, which is a business involved in oil and gas, agriculture and security. The IRG claimed its missiles targeted a “Mossad headquarters”.

“No U.S. facilities were impacted. We’re not tracking damage to infrastructure or injuries at this time,” a U.S. official said in response to the recent attack.

Prime Minister of the IKR, Masrour Barzani, condemned the IRG attacks on Erbil.

The Oil business in Erbil

The oil business is thriving in IKR, and the Falcon Group was part of it. Kurdish oil has been exported to Israel, Italy, France and Greece through a secretive trade depending on pre-pay deals.

Israel buys much of its oil from Erbil, and Israel depends on the heavily discounted crude, making it a key customer. The oil is discounted to Israel because it is free, as the source is the stolen Syrian oil. 40% of Israel’s oil supplies were from IKR in the first three months of 2023, which doubled the amount in 2022.

Israel received its first substantial seaborne crude oil shipment from the IKR in 2014, which is the same time the U.S. occupation forces arrived in Syria. Israel was reportedly importing as much as three-quarters of its crude oil needs from the IKR by mid-2015.

Israeli refineries and oil companies imported almost $1 billion worth of Kurdish oil between May and August of 2023, according to shipping data, trading sources and satellite tanker tracking, which represents about 77 % of average Israeli demand, which runs at roughly 240,000 barrels per day. More than a third of all of the northern Iraqi exports, which are shipped from Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, went to Israel over the period.

According to anonymous sources, it was a Mossad agent who first traveled to Erbil to negotiate the deal to buy oil from IKR, which was facilitated by U.S. officials.

The U.S. Consulate in Erbil

The new U.S. Consulate General building in Erbil, near the attack carried out by Iran, is the biggest consulate complex built by the U.S. Embassies and Consulates are under the U.S. State Department, but the consulate in Erbil has a connection to the U.S. Department of Defense, demonstrating the strategic importance of the region for Washington, with a U.S. military base also in IKR.

Irvin Hicks, Jr., the U.S. Consul General in Erbil, stated in January 2023, that the new 800-million-dollar consulate building is a clear statement that the “United States of America is not going anywhere.”

The U.S. first opened a diplomatic office in Erbil in February 2007, and later upgraded to a consulate general in 2011, the same year the U.S.-NATO attack on Syria began for regime change, under the Obama-Biden administration.

The U.S. embassy in Baghdad was built in 2009 and is its biggest mission compound in the world at a cost of $750 million. Iraqi Kurdistan and the Iraqi central government in Baghdad operate separately, as the Kurds are a semi-autonomous region.

Erbil has 30 consulates, six honorary consulates, and six foreign trade offices, with the Japanese consulate the latest to open on Jan. 11.

“Opening more than 30 consulates is not normal,” Iranian Brigadier General Mohammad Hossein Rajabi criticized. Most of these consulates are used for espionage activities.”

Iran views the foreign offices as having the potential to carry out plans aimed at destabilizing the security of Iran, by hosting Iranian separatist groups and bases aligned with Israeli intelligence agency Mossad.

The Iraqi response to the Genocide in Gaza

“On October 20, 2023, the Department ordered the departure of eligible family members and non-emergency U.S. government personnel from U.S. Embassy Baghdad and U.S. Consulate General Erbil due to increased security threats against U.S. government personnel and interests,” according to the State Department’s Iraq travel advisory.

Iraqis have taken to the streets to protest the U.S. complicity in the genocide being committed in Gaza by Israel. U.S. President Joe Biden has defied the American values of human rights and international law by continuing to send weapons to Israel to promote the wholesale slaughter of the Palestinian civilians of Gaza, even in the face of international criticism which has lowered the image of America as a beacon of freedom to a joke.

Protests have taken place outside of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, and military groups which are under the central government of Iraq have fired rockets and armed drones at U.S. troops based in Anbar and near Erbil multiple times. Baghdad does not recognize Israel; however, the IKR are aligned with the U.S., and sell the stolen oil from Syria to the prime U.S. ally, Israel.

The U.S. invaded and destroyed Iraq in 2003, and occupied the country for years until a withdrawal. When ISIS reared its ugly head, the Baghdad government requested U.S. troops to come to help in the fight against ISIS, which saw its defeat at the hands of Iraq, Syria, Russia, and the U.S. The Iraqi parliament ordered the U.S. troops to leave after the defeat of ISIS in 2017, but the Department of Defense refused. The Prime Minister of Iraq has recently ordered the U.S. troops to leave immediately following the U.S. assassination of Mushtaq Jawad Kazim al-Jawari in Baghdad on January 4, an Iraqi military commander who was instrumental in the defeat of ISIS.

The PKK in Syria and Erbil

The PKK aligned SDF in north east Syria is U.S. supported. The U.S. military in Syria are occupying the largest oil field in Syria, which prevents the Damascus government from using the oil to provide electricity to the Syrian people, who suffer with just 3 hours of electricity per day.

In December 2023, 44-tanker convoy carrying oil stolen from Syria traveled clandestinely to U.S. bases near Erbil. Just days before, U.S. forces took 95 tankers of oil and a truckload of stolen Syrian wheat to IKR. The Syrian wheat fields are also in the area the U.S. troops occupy and the area is controlled by Kurds who are aligned with the IKR.

Farhan Jamil Abdullah, head of the Syrian Oil Company, said in July that as a result of the U.S. sanctions and military occupation in Syria, oil production has decreased to 15,000 barrels per day from 385,000 barrels before 2011.

Firas Hassan Kaddour, the Syrian Oil Minister, said in July that the losses of the energy sector in Syria are close to 100 billion U.S. dollars.

The main oil field of Al Omar and Conoco in Syria are producing oil which is shipped in tankers by the U.S. Army and refined at Kar Oil Refinery in Erbil.

The U.S. sponsors the SDF militia in Syria which is dominated by the YPG. The YPG is the Syrian branch of the PKK, a group recognized by Turkey, as well as the U.S. and the EU, as a terrorist organization, who have killed more than 40,000 persons over decades.

Turkey has condemned the U.S. alliance with the SDF and YPG, and considers the U.S. is financing terrorism.

The commander of the SDF is General Mazloum Kobani, who is also a member of the PKK. His real name is Ferhat Abdi Sahin, is one of Turkey’s most wanted terrorists. Kobani was chosen by the U.S. as their military ally and it is at Kobani’s command that the stolen Syrian oil is loaded into tankers.

Erdogan has demanded for years that the U.S. must stop supporting the SDF, YPG, and to stop encouraging the Kurds to establish an independent homeland in north east Syria on the border with Turkey, which is a NATO member, and ally of the U.S., housing an American military base there.

January 22, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

IRGC officials killed in Israeli attack on Damascus

The Cradle | January 20, 2024

An Israeli airstrike on the Syrian capital Damascus killed four members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) during the early hours of 20 January.

“An Israeli aggression today targeted a residential building in the Mezzeh neighborhood of Damascus,” SANA reports. 

According to Al-Mayadeen, the building targeted consisted of three stories and is affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

“Once again, the evil and criminal Zionist regime invaded the city of Damascus, the capital of Syria,” The IRGC statement following today’s attack read. “During the air attack […] several Syrian forces and four military advisers of the Islamic Republic of Iran were martyred.”

Two high-ranking members of the IRGC were among those killed: Commander Haj Sadegh Omidzadeh, deputy intelligence officer of the IRGC Quds Force, and his deputy, Haj Gholam. 

This attack comes days after Iran targeted a Mossad-affiliated base in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region (IKR) in retaliation for an earlier assassination of an IRGC commander in Syria.

On 16 January, Iranian missiles leveled an alleged Mossad base in IKR’s capital, Erbil, that was reportedly involved in coordinating the recent assassinations of several commanders of the IRGC and the Resistance Axis.

The IRGC noted that this base was used “to develop espionage operations and plan acts of terrorism” across the region, specifically in Iran.

The Iranian operation in IKR killed Kurdish oil tycoon Peshraw Dizayee, owner of the Empire and Falcon Group, who have reportedly facilitated oil exports to Israel.

Iraq condemned the IRGC operation, saying it is “an aggression against the sovereignty of Iraq and the security of the Iraqi people, and an insult to good neighborliness and the security of the region.”

January 20, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

US Troops Flee Syria After Attacks on Bases

Sputnik – 16.01.2024

The US is evacuating its Hemo military base near the airport in the northeastern Syrian city of Kamishli (al-Qamishli) after repeated attacks by “Iraqi resistance” forces, Iran’s Tasnim news agency reports.

“Tasnim’s sources in Syria report the evacuation of the US military base Hemo… in the northern Syrian province of al-Hasakeh due to repeated attacks by Iraqi Islamic resistance groups,” the report said. The agency specifies that the Hemo base, located 4 kilometres west of the Kamishla airport, is considered one of the most important US bases in the Arab republic with at least 350 US military personnel. According to the agency, the base is a training center where the US military trains fighters of the “Syrian Democratic Forces” (SDF).

Last week, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei called on Shiite “resistance fronts” in various Arab countries to “strike the enemy” wherever it is. Shiite movements within the so-called “Islamic resistance in Iraq” announced the first attack on the US military base Hemo near Kamishla airport.

Earlier, Iraqi armed groups said they attacked another US base near the Conico gas field in Deir ez-Zor province in eastern Syria. Additionally, several drones were shot down near Erbil International Airport in northern Iraq, where a base of international counter-terrorism forces is located.

January 16, 2024 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , | Leave a comment

Reviving ISIS: A US weapon against the Resistance Axis

The Cradle | January 16, 2024

Iraqi security sources are warning of an ISIS revival in the country, which coincides all too neatly with the spike in Iraqi resistance operations against US bases in Iraq and Syria, and with widening regional instability caused by Israel’s military assault on Gaza.

More than six years after declaring victory over the terrorist organization, Iraqi intelligence reports now indicate that thousands of ISIS fighters are emerging unscathed, under the protection of US forces in two regions of western Iraq.

The missing piece of the puzzle

According to intelligence reports reviewed by The Cradle, at its height, ISIS consisted of more than 35,000 fighters in Iraq – 25,000 of these were killed, while more than 10,000 simply “disappeared.”

As an officer of one Iraqi intelligence agency recounts to The Cradle :

“Hundreds of ISIS fighters fled to Turkey and Syria at the end of 2017. After the appointment of Abdullah Qardash as the leader of ISIS in 2019, following the death of Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the new Caliph began to restructure the organization, and ordered his followers to return to Iraq. The organization exploited the long border with Syria, the security disturbances, and the diversity of forces on both sides of the border to infiltrate the Iraqi territory again.”

Imprisoned ISIS officials admit that infiltrating that border is not an easy task, because of the strict control imposed by the Iraqi Border Guards and the use of modern technologies, such as thermal cameras.

It therefore became necessary for the terror group to identify intermediaries capable of breaking through or bypassing these fortifications to transport its fighters across borders. 

An Iraqi security source, insisting on anonymity, tells The Cradle that the US plays a vital role in enabling these border violations:

“[There are] several incidents that confirm the American assistance in securing the crossing route for ISIS members – mainly, by shelling Iraqi units on the border, especially the Popular Mobilization Units (PMUs), to create gaps that allow ISIS fighters to cross the border.”

The Iraqi security source adds that there are confirmed reports of US Chinook helicopters transporting fighters from eastern Syria to the Anbar desert in western Iraq and Jebel Hamreen, in the country’s east.

Munir Adib, a researcher specializing in Islamist movements, extremist organizations, and international terrorism, confirms the possibility of the return of ISIS after the organization’s “dozens of attacks in Syria and Iraq in the past few weeks,” which led to the death of tens of civilians and soldiers.

According to Adib, “the international community’s preoccupation with the Gaza and Russia-Ukraine wars gave ISIS an opportunity to reorganize its ranks, while continuing to receive internal and external logistical support.”

Manufacturing and harboring terrorism

Houran Valley is the largest of its kind in Iraq, extending 369 kilometers from the Iraqi-Saudi border to the Euphrates River near the city of Haditha in Anbar Governorate. Its topography is marked by soaring cliffs ranging in height between 150 to 200 meters, and includes the hills surrounding the valley and the sub-valleys that extend into its surroundings.

The valley was and still is one of the most dangerous security environments in the state. Terrorist groups use it as a safe haven because of its desert terrain, and distance from congested urban areas. The valley and its environs have witnessed numerous security incidents, most notably in December 2013, when ISIS killed the commander of the Iraqi army’s Seventh Division, his assistant, the director of intelligence in Anbar Governorate, eight officers, and thirteen soldiers.

Iraqi MP Hassan Salem has called for launching a military operation to clear Houran Valley of terrorist fighters. He confirmed to The Cradle that “there are thousands of ISIS members in the valley receiving training in private camps, under American protection,” noting that US forces have “transferred to this area hundreds of ISIS members of different nationalities.”

US foreign policy, of course, is rife with historical evidence of the creation of proxy armed militias in West Asia and Latin America, often utilizing these organizations to overthrow governments in target countries. We know Washington has no aversion to allying with Islamist extremists largely because of its direct involvement with arming and financing the Afghan Mujahideen, from which the Taliban and Al Qaeda emerged.

An early US-ISIS connection exists quite clearly: the terrorist group’s founding and second rank leaders were among the inmates of Camp Bucca prison in southern Iraq, an internment facility run by the US military. The roster of high-value terrorists captured, then set free by the Americans is quite extraordinary: ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, his successor Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, Abu Muslim al-Turkmani, Haji Bakr, Abu Abdulrahman al-Bilawi, Abu Ayman al-Iraqi, among others.

Camp Bucca, known for abuses against its detainees, brought together extremist elements, slow-boiled this combustive formula for six years (2003-2009), then let the now well-networked extremists go free.

The religious officials of ISIS even say they used their time at the prison to obtain vows from prisoners to join the terrorist group after their release.

US intelligence also protected the terrorist organization indirectly, by allowing ISIS convoys to move between the cities that were under its control. Other forms of protection, according to Iraqi security experts, include refusing to implement death sentences issued by Iraqi courts against detained ISIS members, and establishing safe havens for the organization’s members in western and eastern Iraq.

ISIS: US foot soldiers in the regional war

In a speech on 5 January, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah warned that the US was supporting an ISIS revival in the region.

The Cradle obtained security information monitoring the new activity of extremists in Lebanon, communications between these elements and their counterparts in Iraq and Syria, and suspicious money transfer activities among them.

Lebanese Army Intelligence also recently arrested a group of Lebanese and Syrians who were preparing to carry out security operations.

Importantly, this surge in terror activities comes at a time when the Lebanese resistance is engaged in a security and military battle with Israel, which may expand at any moment into open war. It is also notable that renewed ISIS activity is concentrated in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran; that is, in the countries that support the Palestinian resistance politically, militarily, and logistically.

On 4 January, ISIS officially claimed responsibility for two bombings in the Iranian city of Kerman that targeted memorial processions on the anniversary of the assassination of Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani by US forces. The dual explosions killed around 90 people and injured dozens, in an unprecedented attack targeting the biggest US-Israeli adversary in West Asia – just one day after Tel Aviv killed top Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut.

Before that, on 5 October 2023, ISIS drone-attacked an officers graduation ceremony at the Military College in the Syrian city of Homs, killing about 100 people. These attacks, and others in Iraq, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Africa, indicate that fresh blood, money, and weapons are being pumped into the ISIS organization’s arteries again.

A high-ranking PMU officer, who asked to remain unnamed, tells The Cradle that US forces are preventing Iraqi forces from approaching Houran Valley by attacking any security forces approaching the area. “This happened when American aircraft targeted units of the PMU that were attacking ISIS in the region,” he reveals, citing intelligence reports confirming the presence of dozens of ISIS members and other extremist organizations in the valley, where they receive training and equipment from US forces.

Security sources in the Anbar Operations Command confirm this information:

“Noticeable activity by the organization had been recorded a few weeks ago in the west of the country. Near the Rutba desert, ISIS fighters were spotted digging underground hideouts. Information indicates that the organization is in the process of carrying out terrorist operations in many locations,” they tell The Cradle.

Concurrently, ISIS is expanding its operations in the east of Iraq, within the geographical triangle that includes eastern Salah al-Din Governorate, north-eastern Diyala, and southern Kirkuk, particularly in the geographically challenging Makhoul, Hamrin, Ghurra, Wadi al-Shay, and Zaghitoun areas.

It should be noted that US forces are deployed in Iraq under the umbrella of the International Coalition to Combat ISIS. Last week, four years after the Iraqi parliament first voted to expel foreign forces, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani weighed in on the “destabilizing” impact of US troops and demanded a “quick and orderly” exit of those combat units.

Washington not only countered by saying it has “no plans” to withdraw from Iraq, but announced on 14 January that it would be sending an additional 1,500 troops to Iraq and Syria illegally, and without the consent of either nation.

One irony here is that ISIS appears to regain momentum each and every time Baghdad raises the issue of US military withdrawal from Iraq.

It can also no longer be seen as a coincidence that the terror group is now re-assembling its forces to target Washington and Tel Aviv’s most capable regional foes – the Axis of Resistance – just when the US and Israel are struggling to handle a region-wide, multi-front assault from the Axis.

The extraordinary synergies between the Americans and the world’s foremost terror group can no longer be ignored: their targets are one and the same, and ISIS is only now entering the fray, just as Washington begins to lose its hold on West Asia.

January 16, 2024 Posted by | Deception, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

US to send 1,500 troops to Syria and Iraq

The Cradle | January 15, 2024

The US is set to send 1,500 soldiers to Syria and Iraq, ostensibly in order to join the fight against ISIS, CBS Philadelphia reports on 14 January. 

The soldiers will be sent from the New Jersey Army National Guard in its largest deployment of soldiers to the area since 2008. 

“We have the people we need. We have the training that we need. We have the equipment that we need to fight and win,” Lt Colonel Omar Minott, who is among the 1,500 to be deployed, said. 

The deployment of troops to Syria and Iraq falls under Operation Inherent Resolve, the US military campaign against the Islamic State across Iraq, Libya, and Syria, which calls for combating ISIS and defending US bases against resistance groups in the region. 

The military operation caused a large number of US personnel deployments to the region this year. 

Within the latter half of 2023, the US sent a wave of 2,500 soldiers to Syria and deployed over 900 soldiers to Iraq on two separate occasions. The deployment of these soldiers was to protect US interests against “Iran-affiliated forces.”

According to Axios, the US military presence in the region reached about 45,400 as of October 2023. The majority is in Kuwait, with 13,500; followed by Bahrain at 9,000; and Qatar at 8,000. 

The US deployment into Syria and Iraq to combat ISIS raises questions. According to the US State Department, ISIS attacks in Syria have decreased by 68 percent and 80 percent in Iraq when comparing 2023 to 2022. 

The Cradle’s Robert Inlakesh has said that this push by the US is to keep hold of its dominance in the region. 

“To maintain the dominance of the collective west over the region, the immediate hurdle is overcoming the influences of Iran and Russia. This is why the occupation of roughly a third of Syrian territory by the US and its proxies, along with the imposition of deadly sanctions on Damascus, has become crucial in undermining the strength of its adversaries,” Inlakesh said. 

Iranian and Russian forces in Syria have been coordinating with the specific aim of forcing Washington’s troops to eventually withdraw from the country.

Meanwhile, various Iraqi resistance forces have said they will continue to fight the US until they withdraw from their nation’s borders. 

Kataib Hezbollah spokesman Abu Ali al-Askari has previously said that the group’s operations against the US occupation will continue until the last soldier is removed from Iraq.

January 15, 2024 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Amal Clooney Accuses a French Company, but Ignores the Crimes of the US and UK

By Steven Sahiounie | Strategic Culture Foundation | January 5, 2024

Amal Clooney, the international human rights lawyer, is representing victims of mass atrocities, including genocide and sexual violence, from the Iraqi Yazidi community who are seeking accountability for crimes perpetrated by ISIS.

The case alleges French conglomerate Lafarge SA conspired to provide material and funds to support ISIS terrorist campaigns against the Yazidis.

“Lafarge has admitted to a conspiracy that aided ISIS by providing millions of dollars in cash to ISIS, and is alleged to have provided ISIS with cement to construct underground tunnels and bunkers used to shelter ISIS members and hold hostages, including captured Yazidis,” a news release stated.

Clooney has focused on the French cement company which supported ISIS in Syria in order to remain in business during the war.

The crime committed by Lafarge is serious, but it is just one small incidence of western entities supporting terrorists in Syria following Radical Islam. Clooney is singling out a French company, and France is allied with both the U.S. and UK. While the crime affected hundreds of Yazidis, the same crime carried out by the U.S., UK and EU has affected millions of Syrian citizens.

The Free Syrian Army (FSA) forces were caught selling arms to the ISIS.

Weapons sent to terrorists in Syria from the U.S. directly allowed ISIS to obtain substantial amounts of sophisticated supplies which they used against civilians.

A study by Conflict Armament Research found that anti-tank weapons given to the ‘rebels’ in Syria by the U.S. ended up in the possession of the ISIS within two months of leaving the factory.

The U.S. provided extensive lethal and non-lethal aid to many terrorist groups fighting against the Syrian government. The CIA ran a covert program Timber Sycamore to arm, fund and train terrorists in Syria. U.S. President Trump shut the program down in 2017.

ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, Jabhat al-Nusra and the FSA fighting in Syria all shared the same political platform: to remove the Syrian government in Damascus, and replace it with a Islamic governing system. In March 2011, the U.S. and NATO began a war in Syria for the purpose of regime change. It was not successful, and the same government in Damascus has remained. However, the U.S.-NATO war was very successful in destroying the country, ruining the economy, killing thousands and sending the largest Syrian migrant wave to Europe in history.

U.S. President Barak Obama praised the FSA as ‘moderate’ rebels fighting for freedom and democracy. But, early on the FSA demonstrated that they were fighting to kill Christians and non-Sunni Muslim minorities, and had no interest in lofty ideals of freedom and democracy. They wanted to over throw the Damascus government with the support of the Obama administration, and realize the dream of a Sunni Muslim governing system which was based on Islamic Law, not civil codes.

In April 2014, investigative journalist Seymour M. Hersh exposed the Obama-Clinton “Rat Line”, which was a CIA weapons highway into Syria, serving the terrorists fighting for Obama’s regime change goal. Weapons and ammunition was sent from Libya to Syria via southern Turkey, and the terrorists on the receiving end were affiliated with Al Qaeda, and later aligned with ISIS.

Hersh revealed a 2012 agreement by Obama, and supported by the UK spy agency, MI6, which was responsible for getting weapons from Libya into Syria.

In 2013, Clooney was appointed to a number of United Nations commissions, including as adviser to Special Envoy Kofi Annan on Syria. The U.S. and UK involvement in supporting the terrorists who would later fight alongside ISIS was not any secret.

In 2016, Obama signed into law a defense policy bill which led to U.S. weapons provided to ‘rebels’ ending up in the hands of terrorists following Radical Islam, who became brothers in arms on the Syrian battlefields.

The Yazidis have suffered greatly and should receive justice. Clooney has focused on this one small incidence of ISIS benefiting from a French business. Clooney has ignored that the U.S., UK and their western democratic allies supported, funded, trained and weaponized terrorists in Syria which directly benefitted ISIS.

Where is the international court case to serve justice for the hundreds of thousands of Syrians dead, maimed, raped, kidnapped and made homeless by the FSA and their allies Al Qaeda and ISIS?

Clooney chose an easy win with the case against Lafarge. Clooney said she hopes to get a financial award for the Yazidis from her case so they can rebuild their lives.

The U.S. has prevented the Syrian people from rebuilding any hospital, school or home because of the U.S. imposed sanctions which prevent importing any products for reconstruction. The U.S. sanctions against Syria prevent any wealthy Arab country, or investor, from developing any reconstruction project to benefit the Syrian civilians, such as the repair of the water infrastructure in Aleppo. Last summer, Aleppo suffered cholera because the water plant is in need of repair.

The Syrians have no court case pending, and have no hope of any recovery from their suffering caused by the U.S.-NATO attack on the Syrian people for regime change.

January 6, 2024 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel provokes Iran with assassination in bid to draw the US into war

By Trita Parsi | December 25, 2023

Some brief analysis of the implications of the assassination of Iran’s top commander in Syria, Radhi Mousavi, presumably by Israel.

Bottom line: Israel either killed Mousavi as a warning to Iran, given Tehran’s support for the Houthis’ targeting of ships in the Red Sea, as a provocation to beget an Iranian response that would give Israel the pretext to enlarge the war, or as a preparatory move to enlarge the war regardless of Iran’s response.

It is very likely that Israel is behind the assassination of Mousavi since it is the only power with both a motive and capacity to pull off such a killing – not to mention a long history of assassinating Iranian operatives. The US has the capacity but not necessarily the motive. The analysis below rests on the rather safe assumption that Mousavi was assassinated by Israel.

US intelligence believes that Iran has been actively involved in the Houthi movement’s targeting of ships in the Red Sea, which has effectively closed the Bab el-Mandeb Strait for Israel and cost the Israeli economy billions of dollars. The Houthis insist they will continue the attacks – despite threats of retaliation from the US – until Israel ceases its bombardment of Gaza. Israel, of course, refuses and Biden is loath to press Israel for a ceasefire. From Israel’s perspective, Iran is not paying a price for its alleged role in the Red Sea attacks. The assassination may, as a result, be a warning to Iran that Israel has the capacity and willingness to exact a price from Iran – even in areas where the Iranians may have presumed that they are safe.

In a second scenario, the assassination may be a deliberate provocation to beget an Iranian response that would give Israel the pretext to enlarge the war. While the Biden administration has given Israel a complete green light to bomb Gaza to smithers, Biden opposes an expansion of the war since that very likely could drag the US into it. The debate inside the Israeli government is increasingly leaning toward expanding the war – they have already mobilized +300,000 troops and there is a growing belief in Israel that it simply is intolerable for Israel to live next to Hezbollah. They thought they could manage the threat from Hamas – and they couldn’t. Even though it wasn’t Hezbollah that attacked Israel on Oct 7, the Israeli argument is that next time it might be Hezbollah, and as a result, Israel has no choice but to expand the war. But unless there is an attack from Iran or Hezbollah itself, the US may continue to oppose such a move.

But the assassination of Mousavi may cause Iran to retaliate against Israel via Hezbollah, the reasoning goes, and Israel can then use Hezbollah’s action as a pretext to not only expand the war to Lebanon – but also force the US to go along with it.

There is also a third explanation. According to Amwaj Media, Mousavi was in charge of facilitating the entry of Iran-led forces and arms shipments to Syria as well as Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement. If Israel intends to attack Lebanon, taking out Mousavi could be a logical first step to disrupt the arming of Hezbollah as well as its supply lines. As such, the assassination may be a preparatory move to enlarge the war regardless of Iran’s response to the killing of Mousavi.

All of these scenarios point to one undeniable reality: As long as Biden refuses to pressure Israel to accept a ceasefire in Gaza, tensions in the region will continue to rise and the Middle East will gravitate towards a regional war that very likely will engulf the US as well. Biden may think that he can control these events and allow Israel to slaughter the people in Gaza while keeping a lid on the escalation risk. He is likely wrong – and the American people may soon find themselves in yet another unnecessary war in the Middle East because of Biden’s strategic incompetence.//

December 26, 2023 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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