Routing the secular rebel forces in northwest Syria, al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front quickly amassed a collection of allies among other Islamist factions, including remaining “moderate” groups getting armed by the US. They made short work of Syrian resistence, seizing Idlib, and last weekend the city of Jisr Shughour.
These allies of al-Qaeda apparently didn’t think this through too much, as while they were happy with the victories, they stand to be fleeting indeed, and al-Qaeda could end up being a bigger problem to them than the Syrian military was.
Now, with Assad forces in retreat and the rebels consolidating their gains, the al-Qaeda fighters who dominate this alliance won’t need their allies so much, and those ideological differences will be all the more glaring.
These smaller factions really should’ve seen this coming, as ISIS similarly tried to absorb its allies when it started gaining meaningful territory, and those who were unwilling quickly became enemies.
This split isn’t likely to be immediate in the case of al-Qaeda’s allies, as they are still hoping to move west toward the Latakia coast. Once the promise of easy land dries up, however, more problems are looming.
Moderate al Qaeda? What is that? Didn´t we invade the Middle East in order to rid the world of al Qaeda? Isn´t al Qaeda any longer the sworn enemy of the USA and everything dear to Americans? Didn´t they take down the twin towers on 9-11? Is that what all of this horrific warmongering was all about since 9-11, to convert the al Qaeda terrorists into moderates and then support them? Can I no longer claim al Qaeda as my evil sworn enemy? What about our government´s declaration that either you´re are with us in our fight against al Qaeda or you are against us, making you our enemy as well? Are those supporting the moderate al Qaeda also our sworn enemies?
The only allied solution to this one is, when Al Qaeda or ISIS win, they all hail the winner, and point out that they only dealt with the US in order to fool the infidel scum into providing weapons for Allah's own. The ones who disliked an Al Qaeda victory the most will naturally be the ones to cheer the loudest to show that those wicked slanders weren't true after all.
The fighting is ongoing in the Idlib governorate. The syrian army and paramilitaries have been launching attacks of their own and retaking much territory. Even at Jisr Shughour, there are still syrian soldiers entrenched at the hospital and surroundings who have so far beat back at leat 7 Nusra attempts to over run them. The setbacks the government of Syria fuffered in idlib are being blown out of proportion by the Western and Gulf media. It's all very orchestrated and nothing really new.
Syria continues to stand alone against an ever increasing army of jihadis that jump into the theater every month.
If Iran/Hezbollah/Russia deem al queda a mortal threat to their strategic interests, why aren't they assisting more directly?
The whole region just reminds me of a wake of vultures, each trying to push the next one off a ledge to its death, in order to feed on the carcass that is the Middle East
Syria was stable before the US led coalition of vultures armed jihadis to effect regime change in the country under the banner of 'peaceful protesters wanna topple the government and have 'democracy''.
These are the vultures; the US, the Saudis, Catar, Turkey, Israel, UK, France, etc.
Hezbollah has sent a few thousand of its fighters into Syria to very good effect. There is only so much they can do though. Out of Lebanons small populatin, 4.4 milion, only 27% are shia, hezbollahs manpower pool is small. Iran is helping with military advisers and weapons. Iran also funds hezbollah, which although small, has some of the best light infantry in the world. Iran has been trying to survive a long economic war – sanctions – which has weakened its economy.
Russia is also helping with weapons and ammo. To intervene directly would not be a good idea.
The examples are abundant of how such interventions end badly … including the american ones.
In the end, the brunt of the fighting has to be done by the syrians themselves.
It's a hard fight bc Syria is totally encircled and as u mentioned, jihadis from more than 80 countries keep going there and messing it up.