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ISIS update 11/22/2015.. “next phase”
Putin announces “next phase” in Syria military operation
Obama urges Russia not to target “moderate militants” in Syria
Pres. Assad slams Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar for backing terrorists
Al Qaeda Thanks the U.S. Backed Moderate Rebels for Supplying Anti Tank Missiles
Iranian MP says Saudi Arabia helped ISIL grow in power
War in Syria: Current Events
TheMedvedova
Turkish fighter jets pound PKK positions in Iraq, Turkey
Coalition airstrikes against ISIS hideouts and vehicles
Kurdish Peshmerga capture an ISIS
During last weeks liberation of Sinjar, the Kurdish Peshmerga, PKK & YPG forces captured many ISIS (Islamic State) fighters, some of them were Turkish, but majority of them were Arabs from different Arab Countries: From Saudi Arabia to Tunisia. In this Clip: An ISIS is captured that seem not to have taken a shower for month, and the Kurdish Peshmerga interrogate him in Arabic. Click CC for English.
Syrian Army, Popular Forces Advance to Turkish Borders
The Syrian army and popular forces purged the terrorists and advanced to areas near the Turkish borders.
The Syrian sources in the battlefield said that the Syrian army took control of Zahia heights in the Northern countryside of Lattakia, 2km from the joint borders with Turkey.
The Syrian army, supported by Russia, has launched massive airstrikes against the terrorists’ hideouts in the countryside of Lattakia.
The Syrian troops made major advances in different parts of Lattakia in the past few days after pushing back terrorists from their positions across the coastal province and killed several groups of militants, including their senior commanders.
The Syrian Army and National Defense Forces (NDF) pushed back the terrorist groups form more lands in the Northern territories of Lattakia after fierce clashes with the terrorists on Saturday.
The Takfiri terrorists withdrew from al-Zahi mountains and Burj al-Zahi after their positions came under massive attack of the pro-government forces.
Meantime, nearly 25 militants of the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) and al-Nusra Front were killed in a joint operation carried out by the Syrian Army troops and the Russian air force in Lattakia province.
Command and control centers of the above-mentioned militant groups in Lattakia province sustained heavy damage in the pro-government forces’ (Syrian army, Russian fighter jets and choppers) operation.
The militant groups’ military hardware also was destroyed in the joint operation.
Also, the Syrian fighter jets intensified airstrikes on the Takfiri terrorists’ strongholds in the Lattakia, leaving a large group of the militants dead.
The Syrian air raids hit the Takfiris’ concentration centers in Dweir al-Akrad, al-Sheikh Yousef, Jabal al-Katf and Jabal Abu Hiddo in Lattakia.
Tens of militants were killed in the air attacks.
In the meantime, the Syrian army killed a senior commander of al-Nusra Front in Lattakia province.
The sources said the Syrian troops have killed Zakaria Abdullah, a prominent leader of al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front, in Lattakia province.
The terrorist groups admitted that some 11 terrorists, including their senior commander, have been killed in the Northern countryside of Lattakia.
The Terrorist groups said on their social media pages that 11 of their members were killed in the Northern countryside of Lattakia.
The Takfiri militant groups also published the names and photos of a number of their casualties, including Zakria Abdullah, the so-called leader of the Osman Ghazi Battalion which is affiliated to “Liwa al-Sultan Abdul Hamid” or “Al-Sultan Abdul Hamid Brigade”.
Iraqi Forces Advance towards Ramadi City Center
The Iraqi army and popular forces advanced deep into the center of the city of Ramadi, capital of Anbar province, on Sunday.
“The Iraqi forces backed up by air support continued their advance from the Northern side of Ramadi city and inflicted heavy losses on the ISIL Takfiri terrorists,” the Iraqi defense ministry announced in a statement.
The Iraqi defense ministry said that the army’s engineering unit is currently defusing bombs planted by the ISIL in areas that have been seized back.
On Wednesday, the Iraqi security forces in the province of Anbar announced that half of Ramadi had been won back by the Iraqi army and popular forces.
“50 percent of Ramadi is now under the control of the Iraqi forces,” the Arabic-language Al-Arabiya TV quoted Raje Barakat, member of Anbar governor office’s security committee, as saying.
Barakat said that the Iraqi forces are advancing in Ramadi city from several directions and the ISIL has come under their siege in the city center.
On Tuesday, the Iraqi security forces advanced against the ISIL terrorists in Ramadi city, regaining control of several government buildings and institutions.
Iraq’s anti-terrorism forces said the Iraqi security forces crossed the Euphrates River, for the first time since the ISIL terrorists captured Ramadi city, advancing towards the center of the city.
The Iraqi forces also regained control of several government buildings and institutions in Ramadi.
The Iraqi forces also managed to raise the Iraqi flag over the city’s liberated areas after 4 days of intensified airstrikes on ISIL positions in Ramadi.
Earlier reports said the Iraqi forces destroyed a vehicle carrying ISIL’s missiles in Anbar as army units took control of several new areas in the Western Iraqi province.
The ISIL’s missiles were destroyed by the Iraqi troops in Hasibiya region in the Eastern parts of Anbar province and 7 ISIL militants who were in the vehicle were also killed.
The Iraqi forces also managed to win back new areas in the Southwestern parts of Anbar province.
On Monday, the Al-Anbar Joint Operations Headquarters in a statement announced that the ISIL Takfiri terrorist group’s judge and 70 other terrorists have been killed in Anbar province.
A sum of 20 terrorists were killed during the mop-up operations in Albu Manahi and Albu Daij towns in Fallujah while 15 others were wounded and their three machinegun-equipped vehicles were destroyed, said the statement.
Meantime, 50 other terrorists were killed in the army’s military operation in Albu Faraj region, it added.
On Friday, a sum of 250 ISIL terrorists were killed in military operations in Ramadi city in Anbar province as the Iraqi forces regained control of Albu Hayat area.
Also on Friday, the Iraqi joint forces started new round of operations from three different directions to take full control over the city of Ramadi.
The Iraqi army and the popular forces launched new offensives from the West, Southwest and North against the terrorists’ positions in the center of the city of Ramadi.
The Iraqi forces, meantime, purged terrorists from several areas in the Western suburban areas of Ramadi city.
The Iraqi army and popular forces entered Ramadi after seizing back Al-Warar military base near the city.
Al-Nusra Front Thanks US-Backed FSA for Supplying Anti-Tank Missiles
Syrian, Hezbollah Fighters Destroy Terrorists’ Anti-Aircraft Weapons in Aleppo
Iran Designs ‘Israel’s Nightmare’ Mobile App to Introduce Missiles
Gov’t Forces Marching on ISIL Positions East, Southeast of Aleppo
Syrian Army Plows Vast Areas in Aleppo in Search of Terrorists
Nusra Militants Suffer Heavy Casualties in Syrian Army Attack in Dara’a City
Syrian Army, Hezbollah Hit Militants Hard in Qalamoun
New U.S.-Turkish Bluster For Open War On Syria
….The neocons, here Robert Kagan who wants Hillary Clinton as next president, are already salivating. He claims there is a “crisis of world order”, which is something that never really existed, and he wants U.S. troops to invade Syria and Iraq:
What would such an effort look like? First, it would require establishing a safe zone in Syria, providing the millions of would-be refugees still in the country a place to stay and the hundreds of thousands who have fled to Europe a place to which to return. To establish such a zone, American military officials estimate, would require not only U.S. air power but ground forces numbering up to 30,000. Once the safe zone was established, many of those troops could be replaced by forces from Europe, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other Arab states, but the initial force would have to be largely American.
…
The heretofore immovable Mr. Assad would face an entirely new set of military facts on the ground, with the Syrian opposition now backed by U.S. forces and air power, the Syrian air force grounded and Russian bombing halted.
…..Meanwhile Turkey is introducing another proxy army into Syria. After official protest against Russian attacks on “Turkmen” insurgents Turkey is upping the propaganda and claims to have sent volunteers to defend Turkmen in Syria against the Islamic State. Two border villages were captured. But the Turkmen story does not make much sense. There are hardly any Turkmen in Syria except those Chinese Uyghur Jihadis Turkey smuggled in on false Turkish passports. The volunteers Turkey claims to have send are also not harmless.
…..M.K. Bhadrakumar believes that Erdogan wants to take, and keep, a big slice of Syria up to Aleppo and that this is the beginning of a new phase:
In strategic terms, a defining moment has been reached in the Syrian conflict – the “first step” in the creation of a swathe of land in northern Syria that will be out of bounds for military operations by Syrian government forces, Russian aircraft, or various militia groups such as Hezbollah who are fighting on the side of the Syrian regime.
Put differently, the race for Aleppo has begun.
“Barrel Bombs” And Bullshit: The Tangled Threads Of Washington Lies About Syria And Russia
Submitted by Robert Parry via ConsortiumNews.com,
One way to view Official Washington is to envision a giant bubble that serves as a hothouse for growing genetically modified “group thinks.” Most inhabitants of the bubble praise these creations as glorious and beyond reproach, but a few dissenters note how strange and dangerous these products are. Those critics, however, are then banished from the bubble, leaving behind an evermore concentrated consensus.
This process could be almost comical – as the many armchair warriors repeat What Everyone Knows to Be True as self-justifying proof that more and more wars and confrontations are needed – but the United States is the most powerful nation on earth and its fallacious “group thinks” are spreading a widening arc of chaos and death around the globe
We even have presidential candidates, especially among the Republicans but including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, competing to out-bellicose each other, treating an invasion of Syria as the least one can do and some even bragging about how they might like to shoot down a few Russian warplanes.
Though President Barack Obama has dragged his heels regarding some of the more extreme proposals, he still falls in line with the “group think,” continuing to insist on “regime change” in Syria (President Bashar al-Assad “must go”), permitting the supply of sophisticated weapons to Sunni jihadists (including TOW anti-tank missiles to Ahrar ash-Sham, a jihadist group founded by Al Qaeda veterans and fighting alongside Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front), and allowing his staff to personally insult Russian President Vladimir Putin (having White House spokesman Josh Earnest in September demean Putin’s posture for sitting with his legs apart during a Kremlin meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu).
.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Sept. 21, 2015.
Not surprisingly, I guess, Earnest’s prissy disapproval of what is commonly called “man spread” didn’t extend to Netanyahu who adopted the same open-leg posture in the meeting with Putin on Sept. 21 and again in last week’s meeting with Obama, who – it should be noted – sat with his legs primly crossed.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with U.S. President Barack Obama in the White House on Nov. 9, 2015. (Photo credit: Raphael Ahren/Times of Israel)
This combination of tough talk, crude insults and reckless support of Al Qaeda-connected jihadis (“our guys”) apparently has become de rigueur in Official Washington, which remains dominated by the foreign policy ideology of neoconservatives, who established the goal of “regime change” in Iraq, Syria and Iran as early as 1996 and haven’t changed course since. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “How Neocons Destabilized Europe.”]
Shaping Narratives
Despite the catastrophic Iraq War – based on neocon-driven falsehoods about WMD and the complicit unthinking “group think” – the neocons retained their influence largely through an alliance with “liberal interventionists” and their combined domination of major Washington think tanks, from the American Enterprise Institute to the Brookings Institution, and the mainstream U.S. news media, including The Washington Post and The New York Times.
This power base has allowed the neocons to continue shaping Official Washington’s narratives regardless of what the actual facts are. For instance, a Post editorial on Thursday repeated the claim that Assad’s “atrocities” included use of chemical weapons, an apparent reference to the now largely discredited claim that Assad’s forces were responsible for a sarin gas attack outside Damascus on Aug. 21, 2013.
After the attack, there was a rush to judgment by the U.S. State Department blaming Assad’s troops and leading Secretary of State John Kerry to threaten retaliatory strikes against the Syrian military. But U.S. intelligence analysts refused to sign on to the hasty conclusions, contributing to President Obama’s last-minute decision to hold off on a bombing campaign and to accept Putin’s help in negotiating Assad’s surrender of all Syrian chemical weapons (though Assad still denied a role in the sarin attack).
Subsequently, much of the slapdash case for bombing Syria fell apart. As more evidence became available, it increasingly appeared that the sarin attack was a provocation by Sunni jihadists, possibly aided by Turkish intelligence, to trick the United States into destroying Assad’s military and thus clearing the way for a Sunni jihadist victory.
We now know that the likely beneficiaries of such a U.S. attack would have been Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front and the spinoff known as the Islamic State (also called ISIS, ISIL or Daesh). But the Obama administration never formally retracted its spurious sarin claims, thus allowing irresponsible media outlets, such as The Washington Post, to continue citing the outdated “group think.”
The same Post editorial denounced Assad for using “barrel bombs” against the Sunni rebels who are seeking to overthrow his secular government, which is viewed as the protector of Syria’s minorities – including Christians, Alawites and Shiites – who could face genocide if the Sunni extremists prevail.
Though this “barrel bomb” theme has become a favorite talking point of both the neocons and liberal “human rights” groups, it’s never been clear how these homemade explosive devices shoved out of helicopters are any more inhumane than the massive volumes of “shock and awe” ordnance, including 500-pound bombs, deployed by the U.S. military across the Middle East, killing not only targeted fighters but innocent civilians.
Nevertheless, the refrain “barrel bombs” is accepted across Official Washington as a worthy argument for launching devastating airstrikes against Syrian government targets, even if such attacks clear the way for Al Qaeda’s allies and offshoots gaining control of Damascus and unleashing even a worse humanitarian cataclysm. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Obama’s Ludicrous ‘Barrel Bomb’ Theme.”]
False-Narrative Knots
But it is now almost impossible for Official Washington to disentangle itself from all the false narratives that the neocons and the liberal hawks have spun in support of their various “regime change” strategies. Plus, there are few people left inside the bubble who even recognize how false these narratives are.
So, the American people are left with the mainstream U.S. news media endlessly repeating storylines that are either completely false or highly exaggerated. For instance, we hear again and again that the Russians intervened in the Syrian conflict promising to strike only ISIS but then broke their word by attacking Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front and “our guys” in Sunni jihadist forces armed by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey and the CIA.
Though you hear this narrative everywhere in Official Washington, no one ever actually quotes Putin or another senior Russian official promising to strike only at ISIS. In all the quotes that I’ve seen, the Russians refer to attacking “terrorists,” including but not limited to ISIS.
Unless Official Washington no longer regards Al Qaeda as a terrorist organization – a trial balloon that some neocons have floated – then the Putin-lied narrative makes no sense, even though every Important Person Knows It to Be True, including Obama’s neocon-leaning Defense Secretary Ashton Carter.
The U.S. political and media big shots also mock the current Russian-Iranian proposal for first stabilizing Syria and then letting the Syrian people decide their own leadership through internationally observed democratic elections.
Okay, you might say, what’s wrong with letting the Syrian people go to the polls and pick their own leaders? But that just shows that you’re a Russian-Iranian “apologist” who doesn’t belong inside the bubble. The Right Answer is that “Assad Must Go!” whatever the Syrian people might think.
Or, as the snarky neocon editors of The Washington Post wrote on Thursday, “Mr. Putin duly dispatched his foreign minister to talks in Vienna last weekend on a Syrian political settlement. But Moscow and Tehran continue to push for terms that would leave Mr. Assad in power for 18 months or longer, while — in theory — a new constitution is drafted and elections organized. Even a U.S. proposal that Mr. Assad be excluded from the eventual elections was rejected, according to Iranian officials.”
In other words, the U.S. government doesn’t want the Syrian people to decide whether Assad should be kicked out, an odd and contradictory stance since President Obama keeps insisting that the vast majority of Syrians hate Assad. If that’s indeed the case, why not let free-and-fair elections prove the point? Or is Obama so enthralled by the neocon insistence of “regime change” for governments on Israel’s “hit list” that he doesn’t want to take the chance of the Syrian voters getting in the way?
Reality Tied Down
But truth and reality have become in Official Washington something like Gulliver being tied down by the Lilliputians. There are so many strands of lies and distortions that it’s impossible for sanity to rise up.
Another major factor in America’s crisis of false narratives relates to the demonizing of Russia and Putin, a process that dates back in earnest to 2013 when Putin helped Obama sidetrack the neocon dream of bombing Syria and then Putin compounded his offense by assisting Obama in getting Iran to constrain its nuclear program, which derailed another neocon dream to bomb-bomb-bomb Iran.
It became ominously clear to the neocons that this collaboration between the two presidents might even lead to joint pressure on Israel to finally reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians, a possibility that struck too close to the heart of neocon thinking which, for the past two decades, has favored using “regime change” in nearby countries to isolate and starve Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Palestinian groups, giving Israel a free hand to do whatever it wished…..
……Helping ISIS
This tangle of false narratives is now tripping up the prospects of a U.S.-French-Russian-Iranian alliance to take on the Islamic State, Al Qaeda and other Sunni jihadist forces seeking to overthrow Syria’s secular government.
The neocon Washington Post, in particular, has been venomous about this potential collaboration which – while possibly the best chance to finally resolve the horrific Syrian conflict – would torpedo the neocons’ long-held vision of imposed “regime change” in Syria.
In editorials, the Post’s neocon editors also have displayed a stunning lack of sympathy for the 224 Russian tourists and crew killed in what appears to have been a terrorist bombing of a chartered plane over the Sinai in Egypt.
On Nov. 7, instead of expressing solidarity, the Post’s editors ridiculed Putin and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi for not rushing to a judgment that it was an act of terrorism, instead insisting on first analyzing the evidence. The Post also mocked the two leaders for failing to vanquish the terrorists.
Or as the Post’s editors put it: “While Mr. Putin suspended Russian flights on [Nov. 6], his spokesman was still insisting there was no reason to conclude that there had been an act of terrorism. … While Western governments worried about protecting their citizens, the Sissi and Putin regimes were focused on defending themselves. …
“Both rulers have sold themselves as warriors courageously taking on the Islamic State and its affiliates; both are using that fight as a pretext to accomplish other ends, such as repressing peaceful domestic opponents and distracting attention from declining living standards. On the actual battlefield, both are failing.”
Given the outpouring of sympathy that the United States received after the 9/11 attacks and the condolences that flooded France over the past week, it is hard to imagine a more graceless reaction to a major terrorist attack against innocent Russians.
As for the Russian hesitancy to jump to conclusions earlier this month, that may have been partially wishful thinking but it surely is not an evil trait to await solid evidence before reaching a verdict. Even the Post’s editors admitted that U.S. officials noted that as of Nov. 7 there was “no conclusive evidence that the plane was bombed.”
But the Post couldn’t wait to link the terrorist attack to “Mr. Putin’s Syrian adventure” and hoped that it would inflict on Putin “a potentially grievous political wound.” The Post’s editors also piled on with the gratuitous claim that Russian officials “still deny the overwhelming evidence that a Russian anti-aircraft missile downed a Malaysian airliner over Ukraine last year.” (There it is again, the attempt to dupe Post readers with a reference to “a Russian anti-aircraft missile.”)
The Post seemed to take particular joy in the role of U.S. weapons killing Syrian and Iranian soldiers. On Thursday, the Post wrote, “Syrian and Iranian troops have lost scores of Russian-supplied tanks and armored vehicles to the rebels’ U.S.-made TOW missiles. Having failed to recapture significant territory, the Russian mission appears doomed to quagmire or even defeat in the absence of a diplomatic bailout.”
Upping the Ante
The neocons’ determination to demonize Putin has upped the ante, turning their Mideast obsession with “regime change” into a scheme for destabilizing Russia and forcing “regime change” in Moscow, setting the stage for a potential nuclear showdown that could end all life on the planet.
To listen to the rhetoric from most Republican candidates and Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, it is not hard to envision how all the tough talk could take on a life of its own and lead to catastrophe. [See, for instance, Philip Giraldi’s review of the “war with Russia” rhetoric free-flowing on the campaign trail and around Official Washington.]
At this point, it may seem fruitless – even naïve – to suggest ways to pierce the various “group thinks” and the bubble that sustains them. But a counter-argument to the fake narratives is possible if some candidate seized on the principle of an informed electorate as vital to democracy.
An argument for empowering citizens with facts is one that transcends traditional partisan and ideological boundaries. Whether on the right, on the left or in the center, Americans don’t want to be treated like cattle being herded by propaganda or “strategic communication” or whatever the latest euphemism is for deception and manipulation.
So, a candidate could do the right thing and the smart thing by demanding the release of as much U.S. intelligence information to cut this Gordian knot of false narratives as possible. For instance, it is way past time to declassify the 28 pages from the congressional 9/11 report addressing alleged Saudi support for the hijackers. There also are surely more recent intelligence estimates on the funding of Al Qaeda’s affiliates and spin-offs, including ISIS.
If this information embarrasses some “allies” – such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey – so be it. If this history makes some past or present U.S. president look bad, so be it. American elections are diminished, if not made meaningless, when there is no informed electorate.
A presidential candidate also could press President Obama to disclose what U.S. intelligence knows about other key turning points in the establishment of false narratives, such as what did CIA analysts conclude about the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin attack and what do they know about the July 17, 2014 shoot-down of MH-17.
The pattern of the U.S. government exploiting emotional moments to gain an edge in an “info-war” against some “enemy” and then going silent as more evidence comes in has become a direct threat to American democracy and – in regards to nuclear-armed Russia – possibly the planet.
Legitimate secrets, such as sources and methods, can be protected without becoming an all-purpose cloak to cover up whatever facts don’t fit with the desired propaganda narrative that is then used to whip the public into some mindless war frenzy.
However, at this point in the presidential campaign, no candidate is making transparency an issue. Yet, after the deceptions of the Iraq War – and with the prospects of another war based on misleading or selective information in Syria and potentially a nuclear showdown with Russia – it seems to me that the American people would respond positively to someone treating them with the respect deserving of citizens in a democratic Republic.
Source: http://blogdogcicle.blogspot.com/2015/11/isis-update-11222015-next-phase.html
