Free Syrian Army facing hard times and desertions

Those groups loosely linked together as part of the Free Syrian Army(FSA) are experiencing high levels of desertion and low morale due to low pay and poor conditions.

 

+ Add Image

An article in Al Jazeera describes the situation of five members of a single family who had all joined the FSA. The family member interviewed, Mohammad Matoh, deserted, two brothers went to Turkey after being injured, while two remained in the FSA. Mohammad deserted because of low pay that started at $36 a month. Another friend also left because of the salary, which at best reached $95 a month. Mohammad now works in a fast food restaurant in Aleppo. Another field commander said not only were salaries low but that sometimes they were unpaid because financial support was lacking. In contrast, foreign fighters reportedly receive salaries up to $1,000 a month for serving the Islamic State.

The original FSA began in August of 2011 at the beginning of the Syrian war and was comprised mostly of defectors from the Syrian army. Al Jazeera claims the group is moderate compared with Islamist rebel groups that emerged later and refused to serve under the FSA. The description of "moderate" is relative. Overall in comparison to Islamist Groups such as the Islamic Front that rejects the FSA and its political associate the National Coalition of Syrian and Revolutionary and Opposition Forces perhaps the description makes some sense. However, in 2013 U.S. senior military officials anonymously reported that the Pentagon estimated that the number of extremist Islamist groups in the FSA was over 50 percent and growing. One article estimates the present strength of the FSA is about 35,000 fighters, split up into almost 2,000 smaller factions. Some may be quite secular but others are extremist themselves both in ideology and often in action as shown in the appended video. Around Aleppo, the FSA units work closely with the Al-Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front. The FSA members, whether moderate or not, were all appalled when the U.S. not only bombed IS positions in Syria but the Nusra Front locations around Aleppo, with fighters crucial in the battle against the Assad regime positions there.

After the Islamic State captured large sections of Syria, U.S. policy concentrated on fighting IS rather than relying on the FSA, which was primarily interested in defeating Assad. A new program funded to the tune of $500 million was to train vetted moderate rebels outside of Syria and then send them back, but to exclusively fight the Islamic State. The program was a disaster with the two small groups that did enter Syria as part of the half-billion-dollar program resulting only in radical rebels gaining more U.S. equipment. The first batch were quickly run out of their base leaving their equipment behind. The second group simply surrendered their equipment on entering Syria. The Pentagon decided to ditch the program altogether and provide support and some training to already existing rebel groups committed to fighting the Islamic State theSyrian Democratic Forces.The group includes Kurds, Arabs and others fighting the Islamic State. The group was formally established only on October 11, 2015 and does not include the FSA.

The recent Russia bombing in Syria has been against some of the FSA groups and other rebels as well as the Islamic State and no doubt has helped to weaken the FSA further. Some commentators, such as Robert Fisk who writes for the Guardian and Independent go so far as to say that there is no Free Syrian Army. Rami Jarrah also claimed:'There is no such thing as the Free Syrian Army, people still use the term in Syria to make it seem like the rebels have some sort of structure. But there really isn’t." Irish journalist, Patrick Cockburn, stated in October of this year that "The Free Syrian Army was always a mosaic of fractions and is now largely ineffectual." Whatever its status, the Free Syrian Army seems to be declining in importance in the Syrian conflict and struggling to retain fighters within the loose alliance.

Commander of IS forces in Syria once worked under US-backed Free Syrian Army

While the U.S. emphasizes that it does not support radical jihadists in Syria, it actually supported a group of Chechen jihadists led by Omar al-Shishani or Tarkhan Tayumurazovich Batirashvili, who now commands the Islamic State forces in Syria.

+ Add Image

Abu Omar al-Shishani was first trained by the U.S. as part of an elite Georgian army unit and served until 2006. He was involved in the Georgian conflict with Russia.

Al-Shishani later moved from Georgia and ended up in Syria with a group of Chechen jihadists fighting against the Assad regime. In August 2013 Al Shishani and his jihadist group were instrumental in capturing the Menagh air base that had resisted rebel attacks for 10 months previously:This week, the jihadist group Jaish al-Muhajireen wal Ansar, or the Army of Emigrants and Supporters, led by a fighter from the Caucasus known as Abu Omar al-Shesheni — the Chechen — worked with Free Syrian Army battalions to take the Menagh air base in Aleppo Province after 10 months of trying.Two of his jihadist members drove a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device on a suicide mission into the base killing many of the remaining defenders.

At the time of this attack, the Revolutionary Council of Aleppo was the command structure officially sanctioned and supported by the US and UK. The Council was headed by Free Syrian Army Colonel Abdul Jabbar al-Okadi described by the press as the main recipient of western aid. After the Menagh Base was taken, Colonel al-Okadi appeared in a video alongside Abu Jandal a leader of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria(ISIS):The group singled out for praise in the video, Jaish al-Muhajireen wal Ansar, was precisely Omar Shishani’s own brutal Chechen group (“Army of Emigrants and Helpers”) which turned the tide of the battle. Most significant about FSA Col. Okaidi himself, clearly the operational head of this jihadi “basketball team,” was that he had been paid a personal visit by his State Department patron, Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford, just months prior to the final victory at Menagh.

This shows at one time that the FSA and the Islamic State fought alongside each other under command of the US-supported FSA.

Ford admitted that rebels funded by the U.S. State Department included ISIS. He told a McClatchy reporter he had called Oakaidi to tell him cooperation with Shishani and his jihadists was "extremely unhelpful, extra unhelpful." What it shows is that even rebels supported by the U.S. have a quite different agenda than the U.S. They care less about how radical the groups are they ally with as long as they are helpful in fighting Assad. Rebels of every stripe were horrified and angered when the U.S. bombed the Al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front. The only reason rebels fight the Islamic State is that IS has attacked them.

You would think that Okaidi's relationship with the U.S. would end with the IS episode but in July 2015 Okaidi was interviewed on CNN by Christiane Amanpour appealing for a US no-fly zone in Syria to support moderate rebels. In a recent poll by ORB international 82 percent of Syrians blamed the U.S. for the growth of ISIS. This would not be the first time the U.S. had encouraged jihadists only to suffer blowback. The CIA funded jihadists in their successful campaign against the Soviet-backed regime in Afghanistan including one well-known jihadist by the name of Osama Bin Laden. As with Bin Laden, Shishani became a wanted terrorist.

Shishani was added to the US Treasury Department's list of Specially Designated Global terrorists on September 24th 2014. On May 5 2015 the U.S. State Department Rewards for Justice Program announced that a reward of up to US $5 million is offered for information that could lead to his capture. The appended video purports to show an attack by the FSA on the Islamic State led by an Al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front commander just in August.

US general claims less than half dozen US-trained rebels remain in Syria

Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, the head of CENTCOM and the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, said there were only four or five Syrian rebels trained by the U.S. military still in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria.

+ Add Image

General Austin also said the U.S. would not reach its goal of training 5,000 Syrian fighters in the near future. In effect, Austin's testimony before the U.S. Armed Services Committee showed that the Defense Department $500 million program was going nowhere.

Republican Senator John McCain, chair of the committee, wanted to know why the U.S. had not set up a no-fly zone over Syria to help protect civilians from being bombed by the Assad government. Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill said that despite all the talk from US military officials about how well the war was progressing there seemed no recognition of the "practical realities". Intelligence agents have complained that their negative reports on the war against the Islamic State are being altered by superiors.

The Defense Department had announced last May that they intended to train up to 5,400 fighters each year in a strategy designed to combine US bombing with proxy local troops on the ground against the Islamic State. The U.S. has been reluctant to send American troops against the Islamic State, although there are no doubt some special forces operating in secret in Syria. The problem for the U.S. is that the rebels are interested primarily in fighting against Assad and not the Islamic State. Many are particularly incensed at the U.S. bombing of the Al-Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front. In some areas the Front is a key player in attacking Assad. The Front has retaliated by successfully attacking U.S.-trained rebels and seizing their weapons.

The U.S.-trained rebels called the New Syrian Force(NSF) began with only 54 with all but four or five either having been killed or fleeing, according to General Austin. Present classes in training are about 100 to 120 fighters, nowhere near the over-5,000 target. In spite of the fact that the Pentagon repeatedly praises and promotes the program, General Austin said it was reviewing it.

Recent reports indicate the Obama administration is finally planning a major overhaul of its strategy. The new plan will see the U.S.-trained rebels embedded with Kurdish and Arab forces in northeastern Syria. The rebels would be trained to use U.S. communications equipment, enabling them to provide intelligence and designate targets for U.S. bombing. The numbers to be trained are being scaled back to around 500 per year, just one tenth of the original plans.

Planned Syrian Safe Zone still not clearly defined

Ever since the U.S. and Turkey announced an agreement that would see Turkey fight the Islamic State(IS) and grant the U.S. use of a Turkish air base to launch attacks, there has also been talk of a "safe zone" in northern Syria along the Turkish border.

+ Add Image

The zone is to be a little more than 60 miles long. Now many weeks later it is still not clear who will be in power in the zone, how it can be kept safe, or even how it can happen given that both Turkey and the U.S. have ruled out using ground troops. Rebel groups will be the proxy force used to capture and run the zone. However, Al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front has ruled out any cooperation with the plan and announced it will withdraw from its front lines with IS in the area. The Front is angry at the continued U.S. bombing of its positions. It has also attacked U.S.-trained rebels who now have refused to fight back against the group. Many rebel groups are incensed that the U.S. attacks the Front. It is not only battling with IS but also contributes key fighters against Assad in many areas.

Originally it was thought the zone would include a lot of IS territory but more recently suggestions are that more of the safe zone will border areas controlled by Kurds. This seems incongruous because Kurds are fighting the IS and Kurdish-controlled areas are relatively peaceful. There seems no need for a buffer zone between their areas and Turkey. Such a safe zone would become part of the Turkish battle against the Kurds. It is not clear that the U.S. would cooperate in creating such a zone. Many local people in areas rumoured to be in the "safe zone" regard talk of the zone as empty promises that will not work. They see a continued bombing campaign.

Analyst Yezid Sayigh of the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut agrees with the locals: “I don’t think we will see anything approaching what even resembles a safe zone. If you’re going to have significant numbers of people sheltering in the zone, you’ll need various things — like electricity, fuel, water tanks, piping, clinics.” Neither Turkey nor the U.S. are drawing up plans for these large humanitarian and reconstructions projects. Instead they are launching a PR campaign for what he claims is an unworkable project.

According to international law safe zones are neutral areas where civilians are guaranteed protection. American officials envision a zone 68 miles long and 40 miles deep that would reach the outskirts of Aleppo. It would be a staging area for US-backed rebels to attack the Islamic State. This would obviously not be a safe zone as ordinarily understood. The plan also ignores that there are few US-backed rebels left. Most rebel groups receive no U.S. aid and are not on good terms with the US since the rebels main aim is not to fight IS or the Nusra Front but Assad forces.

The U.S. officials said the zone would not be declared a protected area. Turkey wanted the zone to serve as a refuge for Syrian refugees and prevent the continued influx of refugees into Turkey itself. If rebel attacks are being launched from the zone refugees would hardly be safe from attack.

Turkey wants part of the zone to be policed by a radical Islamist group, Ahrar al-Sham, that cooperates with the Nusra Front. The U.S. is unlikely to agree to this. Aaron Stein of the Atlantic Council Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East says:“The plan is nebulous. The area is huge; it’s not well-defined. There may be local governance structures set up” in the zone but it’s not a textbook safe zone.”Given that the area will be a staging ground for attacks on IS, the role of organizations providing aid to refugees will be complicated. Refugees will no doubt continue to flood into Turkey to avoid what will be a battle zone. The appended video has U.S. officials denying there is even any agreement on the zone in contrast to reports from Turkey.

The outlines of the zone have been talked about since late in July. The original plan involved driving the IS out of a 68-mile-long area west of the Euphrates River into the province of Aleppo. The area would come under control of the Syrian opposition. Clearly it is not a "safe zone." The area would not be a no-fly zone but the US has already announced that it will attack any group that attacks US-trained rebel groups. However, those troops are few in number at present and obviously other rebel groups would be required to control the area. The plan would result in IS losing control of all border crossings into Turkey and help stop the influx of foreign fighters. The plan could also bring the U.S. in direct conflict with Assad forces should the US defend the area against Assad bombing or other attacks.

Obama authorizes bombing of any groups that attack US-trained rebels in Syria

President Barack Obama has authorized the bombing of any forces that attack US-trained rebels. This could include attacks by troops loyal to President Assad of Syria.

 

+ Add Image

This marks a considerable increase in US involvement in the Syrian civil war, since up to now, Obama has not authorized bombing of Assad's forces. The Wall Street Journal first reported the new policy.

While the officially reported aim of US air strikes in Syria has been to combat the Islamic State, from the very first it has gone beyond that with attacks on the Al-Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front. These attacks angered virtually all the other rebel groups since the Front has often been a key player in battles against Assad forces. It has also fought against the Islamic State. The result has been that the Front now attacks rebel groups it believes are trained or armed by the US.

The Nusra Front claims responsibility for capturing members from Division 30 in Aleppo province early last week and also an attack on the unit's base on Friday that is said to have killed 5 rebels and wounded another 18. US bombs and the clashes also reportedly killed 18 members of the Front. So far Syrian air defence units have not threatened allied bombers as they attack the Islamic State and Al Nusra. If those planes attack Syrian troops for whatever reason Assad might try to shoot them down. However, this might risk the US deciding to take out his entire air defence system so perhaps he might hold off until he sees how frequently his forces come under US attack. A senior military official said on Sunday: “For offensive operations, it’s ISIS only. But if attacked, we’ll defend them against anyone who’s attacking them. We’re not looking to engage the regime, but we’ve made a commitment to help defend these people.”If the rebels attack Assad forces, as they very well might, naturally the Assad regime will fight back. However, the rebels trained by the US are supposed to have as their first priority fighting the Islamic State. If those rebels do so then the Assad forces may leave them alone and not provoke any bombings of their forces by the US. So far the US has avoided direct confrontation with Assad forces. Russia said that any US attacks against Assad forces would further destabilize the situation.

A time-line of the US training program is given in this article. Although the program planned to train up to 5,400 fighters a year, so far there appear to be fewer than 60 fighters trained and in Syria. They barely arrived when attacked by Al Nusra Front. Among those captured by the the Front were the group's commander. Many rebel groups especially Islamists are becoming increasingly hostile to the US-trained rebels since most other rebels have as their first priority defeat of Assad.

Top leader of Islamic Front group and others killed in suicide attack in Syria

In a pair of suicide bombings in the town of Idlib, Abu Salqeen, the leader of Ahrar al-Sham, and six other members were killed including senior figures. Other top figures were among those killed.

+ Add Image

Ahrar al-Sham is the most powerful group in the umbrella organization the Islamic Front. The latter is composed of Islamists who reject the western demand for a secular state in Syria and intend to create a state based upon Sharia law. The Islamic Front is widely regarded as funded by rich individuals in Saudi Arabia and perhaps even by the state. The members are conservative Islamists, many of the Salafist orientation that is very much like the official Saudi version of Islam. Ahrar al-Sham co-ordinates with other groups in the fight against Assad and also the Islamic State. Some of its members have been linked to Al Qaeda, although the official Al Qaeda group in Syria is the Nusra Front. The relations of Ahrar al-Sham with the Nusra front has varied from cooperation to conflict. Al-Sham is said to be partially funded by wealthy donors in Kuwait.

Even though Ahrar al-Sham is composed of conservative Islamists and the Islamic Front is not part of the overall western-supported military structure in Syria, there have been recent attempts for al Sham to rebrand itself along with the rest of the Islamic Front as "moderate." The move is intended to allow the group to receive aid from the U.S. Given the challenge of the Islamic State and the relative lack of moderates with any significant power in Syria, the U.S. has itself been rethinking who they will consider a moderate. James Clapper, the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, recently said:" Moderate these days is increasingly becoming anyone who is not affiliated with ISIL." While the U.S. has not itself yet provided funding for Ahrar al-Sham, it has not complained when the Saudis and Turkey decided to fund radical Islamist groups in Syria. The Saudis and Turks appear to make defeating Assad a priority rather than defeating the Islamic State first, as seems to be the U.S. policy.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, although many suspect the Islamic State is the culprit. Lately, there has been disagreement with the Al Nusra Front as well. The attack comes shortly after a senior al-Sham member published an op-ed article in the Washington Post in which he denied the group espoused al-Qaeda ideology. He claimed the group is composed of moderate Islamists anxious to defeat the Islamic State.

Last September, there was also a devastating suicide attack on al-Sham that killed many of their leaders as well. A video of the attack is appended.

Turkey and Saudis backing extremist rebels in Syria including Al-Qaeda-linked group

Turkey and Saudi Arabia are now openly backing Islamic extremists including the Al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra, part of the new coalition called the "Conquest Army."

+ Add Image

The leader of another radical group in the coalition Ahrar al-Sham claimed previously that his group was the "real Al-Qaeda." The U.S. is said to be concerned that the new alliance between Turkey and Saudi Arabia will end up replacing Assad with a militant Islamic government, precisely the type of result the U.S. wants to avoid. The U.S. focus is on degrading the Islamic State but it has also attacked the Nusra Front in Syria angering rebels of all stripes since the group has been forcefully attacking the Assad regime. While the U.S. is planning to train and arm moderate rebels that it has vetted, the Pentagon wants them to concentrate on attacking the Islamic State. Most rebels together with Turkey and Saudi Arabia and many other Arab states think the first order of business should be defeating the Assad regime forces.

Turkey and Saudi Arabia have often been at odds as to whom they should support among the rebels. Turkey favours groups linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, which Saudi Arabia opposes. Saudi Arabia has not officially supported radical groups at the urging of the U.S. However, both countries and others are fed up with the lack of U.S. action against Assad. Now the two countries are joined in support for radical groups that have already gained ground in Idlib province.

The present pact dates back to March, when Recep Erdogan, the Turkish president, flew to Saudi Arabia to meet the newly-crowned King Salman. In spite of differences over the Muslim Brotherhood, the Saudi king saw Turkey as an ally in his war against Iran and Shias in general that is evident in his leading in the bombing of the Shia Houthi rebels in Yemen as well. In Syria, Saudi money together with Turkish logistical support can be used to defeat the Assad forces. Assad's government is dominated by members of a Shia sect although a majority in Syria are Sunni. Joshua Landis, who directs the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma said:"It's a different world now in Syria, because the Saudi pocketbook has opened and the Americans can't tell them not to do it. It's quite clear that Salman has prioritized efforts against Iran over those against the Muslim Brotherhood."

The agreement has led to a new joint command center in the province of Idlib in northeast Syria. President Obama has not commented on the new Saudi-Turkish agreement. This is surprising since the alliance includes the Al Nusra Front, which is a target of the U.S. war on terror and has been bombed in Syria by the US. It is almost as if the US has accepted that there will be a dual fight in Syria. The U.S. will concentrate on aiding moderate rebels to tackle the Islamic State while the Saudis and Turks allied with radical Islamists will take on Assad's forces. Some in the media claim that Obama is taking a hands off approach and is disengaged. Yet he is arming and training moderate rebels and he is bombing the Islamic State constantly. What we are seeing is a dual thrust in Syria. and a division of tasks.

Some reports on the new alliance suggest even more involvement in Syria by Turkey and Saudi Arabia: "Turkey would provide ground troops supported by Saudi Arabian air strikes, to assist moderate Syrian opposition against the regime forces." The "moderate rebels" in this case involve Al-Qaeda linked Jabhat al-Nusra. The main Turkish opposition party also claims that Turkey is poised to send troops into Syria as soon as this weekend. The Turkish president has denied the claim as shown on the appended video. Conflict in Syria appears about to escalate and the tide could turn against Assad. Escalation is a dangerous move in an area that is already very unstable and filled with conflict. If Assad is overthrown, Syria may end up with numerous competing militias and a situation worse than Libya.

US-led bombing raids targeting infrastructure causing civilian casualties

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a pro-rebel reporting group based in the UK, claims that a US air strike on an oil refinery in northern Syria killed at least 30 people.

The Observatory said that although some IS militants were among those killed, many were civilian locals who worked at the refinery. The attack is one of many directed not at the military bases of the IS but critical infrastructure. The U.S. admits that the intent is to deny IS funds that it gets from oil resources. The IS controls much of the oil-producing regions of Syria. Not only does this type of attack involve deliberately attacking targets that will involve civilian casualties, they also hurt the civilian population in areas occupied by the IS, since the funds from oil also provide not only jobs for locals but also are partly used to fund services in IS-controlled areas.

After an attack on the village of Kfar Daryan last September that is said to have killed at least a dozen civilians, the Obama administration admitted that its restrictive targeting rules meant to avoid civilian deaths did not apply to air strikes in Syria or Iraq: National Security Council spokesman Caitlin Hayden confirmed that the same rules no longer apply.

Hayden said the 'near certainty' standard was created for attacks 'outside areas of active hostilities' which 'simply does not fit what we are seeing on the ground in Iraq and Syria right now.'

This attack was on a group within the Al Nusra front US intelligence calls the Khorasan. The result of this attack was for Al Nusra to turn on US funded rebels ultimately destroying the CIA's favourite moderate rebel group Harakat Hazm . The Front captured their base along with a huge cache of US provided weapons. Photos of the destruction caused by the attack can be foundhere. The appended video shows one reaction to the attack. No Arab states actually took part in the bombing of the Nusra Front only against IS targets. Before this attack, the Al Qaeda-linked Front had cooperated with other rebel groups in attacks both against Assad forces and the Islamic State. All rebel groups of every stripe condemned the strike.

Last December 28th, an attack on a building containing a jail may have killed 50 or even more civilians that were being held inside. Journalists Roy Gutman and Mousab Alhamadee said the building was completely destroyed and it was days before workers could retrieve all the bodies according to their report in McClatchy: "McClatchy located two sources who confirmed a high civilian death toll from the strike. One witness, an activist in Al Bab, gave the death toll as 61 civilian prisoners and 13 Islamic State guards. The Syrian Network for Human Rights estimated the death toll at 80, and said 25 of those were Islamic State Guards and another 55 were either civilians or imprisoned fighters from non-Islamic State rebel groups."The US acknowledged: "Coalition aircraft did strike and destroy an ISIL headquarters building in Al Bab on Dec. 28." There is no mention of civilian casualties or that the building included a jail. Later the Pentagon noted it had received nine reports of civilian deaths in Syria and that it was still investigating four but did not say if the Al Bab incident was under review.

Other attacks on infrastructure include one on grain silos. The policy of attacks on infrastructure date back to last September. On September 29th we have this report:"In eastern Syria, U.S.-led forces bombed a gas plant controlled by the Islamic State outside Deir al-Zor city, wounding several of the militant group's fighters, the Observatory said. The United States has said it wants strikes to target oil facilities held by Islamic State to try to stem a source of revenues for the group.The raid hit Kuniko gas plant, which feeds a power station in Homs that provides several provinces with electricity and powers oil fields generators, the Observatory said."

A policy of targeting infrastructure fails to take into account the extremely negative effects this will have on those living in IS-controlled areas and also the inevitable civilian casualties these bombings caused.

US and Russia discuss Syrian settlement as US program to arm moderates in tatters

Russian and U.S. officials have had new talks on finding a political solution to the Syrian civil war and a unified battle against the Islamic State in Syria. However, it is not clear how serious the discussions are.

+ Add Image

Secretary of State John Kerry confirmed that he had talked to his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Geneva on the issues. Kerry said that in discussing Syria they talked "about steps that might be..taken to try to see if there is common ground". He also said that “one of the things that drives that interest . . . is the reality of what is happening to Syria as a result of the presence of Daash there and its use of Syria as a base for spreading its evil to other places.” Daash is the Arabic term for the Islamic State. However, in the following days he also spoke about stepping up "military pressure" on the Assad regime once the Islamic State is defeated. The US aim still appears to be regime change in Syria although the first priority is to attack the Islamic State in Syria. Not only will many rebel groups not be interested in peace talks, Assad may not be either as the number of moderate groups arrayed against him are shrinking and also the Islamic State is being attacked by all sides.

Kerry said that military pressure on the Assad regime would probably be required to obtain a political solution:“Military pressure particularly may be necessary, given President Assad’s unwillingness to negotiate seriously. And what we must do is strengthen the capacity for this political solution.”

The last peace talks on Syria sponsored by the US and Russia in Geneva in February 2014 broke down. One reason for the breakup was Assad's insistence that fighting terrorism must be the top priority while the opposition wanted to focus on a transitional government that would exclude Assad. Now there is more of a focus by the US as well on the terrorism associated with the Islamic State. However, rebels are still mostly concerned with ousting Assad. Even last week in Aleppo rebel groups rejected a UN proposal to freeze fighting in Aleppo, a city divided between government held areas and areas held by the opposition. Russia has scheduled a meeting with Syrian opposition leaders in April.

The covert CIA operation to arm "moderate" Syrian rebels has been undermined by the dissolution of the Hazzm movement with their base being taken over by the Al Qaeda-linked Al-Nusra Front. Much US provided equipment and weapons in a warehouse on the base was captured, as shown on the appended video. Some of the members of the movement joined the Al-Nusra Front. To a considerable extent this was all caused by US policy. When the US coalition bombed the IS in Syria, the US--but not other members of the coalition--also bombed Al-Nusra positions, While they claimed only to be targeting the Khorasan group, they are part and parcel of Al Nusra. All rebel groups were incensed by the attack on Al-Nusra, which had been cooperating with other rebels. Consequent to the bombings, Al-Nusra Front turned on rebel groups funded by the US, first and foremost the Hazzm movement.

No other groups came to the rescue of the Hazzm group, since many disliked the group and saw them as the "favourite son" of the Americans who got everything while other groups got little or nothing. The apparent US solution to the problem of finding moderates to train in a new program is to consider any group not directly affiliated with the Islamic State as moderates. The Nusra front may cooperate by going along with a re-branding exercise being pushed by Qatar and some other Arab states. The Front would cut off any formal ties to Al Qaeda. In return they would receive more funding and perhaps even the blessing of the US as moderate rebels.

US may be planning regime change in Syria as first priority over defeating IS

The Obama administration is now reviewing its strategy for fighting the Islamic State.The strategy in Syria has been to bomb the Islamic State positions but also those of the Nusra Front the Al-Qaeda-linked group that often cooperates with other rebels.

The bombings have been almost universally condemned by rebel groups on the ground. The present policy puts fighting the Islamic State first and dealing with Assad later. The new policy may be intended to assuage the rage of rebel groups and bring them back on side rather than making attacks against IS the first order business: Instead, the new Syria strategy appears to be the military removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, even though his forces are the major significant anti-ISIS force inside Syria, and officials now seem to believe that ousting Assad first and cobbling together a new regime from the non-existent “moderate” factions that the Pentagon is supposed to be creating, is the key to the war. Senior US diplomats and US officials told CNN that Obama had asked for a review of US policy in Syria "after realizing that ISIS may not be defeated without a political transition in Syria and the removal of President Bashar al-Assad". The need for a review indicates a realization that putting the defeat of the Islamic State as the first task in Syria was not going to work.
 The administration appears to take the change in strategy to be urgent. Within the last week there have been four meetings of the President's national security team that have dealt with US strategy in Syria. CNN reports that "other sources" deny that there is even a review happening but merely constant discussion and "recalibration" of the US fight against the Islamic State. Alistair Baskey, spokesperson for the National Security Council said on Wednesday: "The strategy with respect to Syria has not changed: "While the immediate focus remains to drive ISIL out of Iraq, we and coalition partners will continue to strike at ISIL in Syria to deny them safe haven and to disrupt their ability to project power. Assad has been the biggest magnet for extremism in Syria, and the President has made clear that Assad has lost all legitimacy to govern. Alongside our efforts to isolate and sanction the Assad regime, we are working with our allies to strengthen the moderate opposition ..."
 Part of the problem for the US is that a policy of concentrating on defeating IS in Iraq first while bombing IS in Syria to weaken them has through the bombing united jihadists against the US and turned them against the very moderate rebel groups that the US supports. In some cases moderate rebel groups have simply surrendered or at least lost their territory to the Nusra Front. This disaster should have been foreseen. Perhaps these anonymous leaks by officials to news media such as CNN are trial balloons.
 Should the US decide to attack and degrade Assad's forces this could only result in the advance of groups such as the Islamic Front which though not aligned with Al Qaeda are Islamist in their ideological orientation. Unlike Libya where it has taken some time to create something akin to a failed state the US could achieve this end much more quickly in Syria by ousting Assad. The difference might be that the US would no doubt see that things were not working out so they must intervene even more forcefully while trying to entice allies to join them in the quagmire they created.
 The Obama administration has requested a half billion to train and equip 5,000 vetted Syrian rebels within a year. One of the vetted groups has already been soundly defeated by the Nusra Front. The program was announced four months ago but the vetting has not yet started. Rear Admiral John Kirby a Pentagon spokesperson said: "The vetting hasn't started. Once it does start, that will be about a three- to five-month process and then it's about eight to nine months of training after that. So we still (have) a ways to go."
 New strategy is also being demanded by US allies such as Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Turkey, all of whom want to get rid of Assad as a priority. There is even talk of negotiations including Russia to somehow form a transition government that would ease Assad and his inner circle out of power but leave much of the regime and its institutions intact. This is surely bizarre. After years of fighting against Assad's forces the rebels would not accept that the armed forces or the regimes institutions simply be left in place during a transition. Again CNN quotes a senior Arab diplomat anonymously of course: "It's not going to be tomorrow and I don't think anyone even believes that is physically possible. But even if it is a six- or 12-month plan, as long as it has an exit for Assad. But we are glad that we finally see a meeting of the minds with the U.S. that there needs to be a rethinking of the strategy."

 At the time that Obama first ordered bombings of IS and the Khorasan group within the Nusra Front in Syria he did not seek the permission of the Syrian government and indicated what action he would take if Assad tried to stop the US bombing raids: He made clear the intricacy of the situation, though, as he contemplated the possibility that Mr. Assad might order his forces to fire at American planes entering Syrian airspace. If he dared to do that, Mr. Obama said he would order American forces to wipe out Syria’s air defense system, which he noted would be easier than striking ISIS because its locations are better known. He went on to say that such an action by Mr. Assad would lead to his overthrow, according to one account.
 Both Syria and Russia claimed that the US bombings in Syria violated international law and the UN charter. The US replied through State Department spokesperson Marie Harf with an ad hominem attack on Russia and a legal justification in terms of US law:
 “I find it interesting that Russia’s suddenly taken an interest in international law, given some of their past behavior. The President has the authority as Commander-in-Chief under the United States Constitution to take actions to protect our people. And any action we take overseas, of course, we will have an international legal basis for doing so. I don’t have predictions about what that is, given we haven’t announced additional actions yet.”
 As in Iraq and Afghanistan the US may act first and then seek international blessing after they are already occupying Syria either themselves or through their proxies on the ground as might be the case in Syria, although perhaps some US boots on the ground may be required. Russia could easily turn the ad hominem around and point out US actions against international law. The Russians prefer to simply deny what is happening as in the advance of tanks and other equipment into rebel areas of eastern Ukraine, rather than even face the question of violating international law. After all, if you did not do what the other side claims, you are innocent of breaking international law. Of course bombings are hard to hide or deny although Egypt and the UAE take the Russian position and deny that they were involved in any bombings in Libya.
  The new developments in US Syria policy give some credence to the theory that bombing the Islamic State in Syria was just a pretense and a way of opening up Syria and the Assad regime to bombing that would oust Assad. It could develop into the Libyan scenario where very quickly the US gains control of the skies after knocking out Assad's defense systems. However, at the same time there will be attacks on radical jihadists such as IS and the Nusra Front.
 Perhaps there will be some false flag operation of firing at US planes to set up a justification for the policy. It is unlikely that the US will seek a fig leaf such as the UN motion on Libya by which the bombings were said to be to protect the Libyan people. This would not work because the revived Evil Empire, Russia, would veto the resolution. The appended video from about a month ago predicts what seems to be the changing policy of the US in Syria. Other commentators have made similar predictions and also see the bombing of the IS in Syria as a way to get at Assad. Russian foreign minister Lavrov as well worried about that prospect when the bombings first began.

US bombings of Nusra Front in Syria produce disastrous blowback

The U.S. has in effect opened a new front against Jabhat al-Nusra in Syria a move that has already created disastrous results for moderate rebels the US hopes to train and arm.

When the US started it first airstrikes in Syria there were two separate operations. One group of bombings involved coalition partners including some Arab states and was only directed against positions of the Islamic State. However another set of attacks were directed against the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra or at least part of that group the Khorasan. While there is such a group, it is part and parcel of the Nusra Front. Locals have not even heard of the Khorasan, and the members involved do not use the name as it is an invention of the intelligence community:The name of the group was coined by intelligence agencies as a reference to the high-ranking Khorasan Shura, a leadership council within al-Qaeda which many members of the group belong to. The Khorasan operate in Syria alongside other Al Nusra front members but the US maintains that they are busy plotting against western interests and manufacturing bombs to blow up airliners. Attacks against them are easily justified by the ongoing war on terror and by representing them as a direct threat to the US.
US policy analysts seem to wear blinkers. They cannot look left or right but only straight ahead at the war on terror to plan military action against Islamic Jihadists. As a result, they fail to see that Syrian rebels of all stripes are intent on getting rid of Assad. Radical jihadists are seen as among the most effective fighters against the regime. Naturally, other rebels will fight the Islamic State when attacked by it but not otherwise. Al Nusra front often cooperates with all the other rebel groups so attacking it means weakening the fight against Assad. Rebels of all stripes protested the attack on the Nusra Front.
The bombings also caused a reaction within the front creating a new policy that has already had the result of two important groups of vetted moderate rebels being driven out of the areas they have held and in one case their US-provided weapons falling into the hands of the Nusra Front, an event that the US was at pains to prevent. Not surprisingly the Nusra Front now regards US-backed moderate rebels as the enemy. The leader of Al Nusra Abu al-Golani accused moderate US-supplied rebels were "Western collaborators".
 US intelligence officers had warned that any bombing of the Nusra Front would drive a wedge between the group and other rebels and draw a target on the rebels' backs. For once the intelligence community appears to be right but the situation is even worse than that because those with the targets on their back are in some cases deciding to join the jihadists against Assad rather than advance US aims. Abu Abdullah a commander of a brigade allied with the moderate Syrian Revolutionaries Front said that if the US continued to attack al Nusra, he and his men would swear allegiance to Al-Golani the Front's leader. Abdullah argues that the only interest of the US is in defeating the Islamic State and that moderate rebel groups are being set up to sacrifice as proxy troops to carry out US policy. The main aim of rebels of all stripes is the defeat of Assad.
 Another immediate result of the bombing of the Nusra Front was the defeat of two main moderate rebel groups the Syrian Revolutionary Front and the Harakat Hazm group. Both have been driven out of the areas they held. As a response to these events the US is carrying out further bombing raids against the Nusra Front in an apparent attempt to prevent the loss of even more moderate-held territory close to the Turkish border. Syrian rebels do not see the US bombing of Al Nusra in terms of US policy aims but in terms of their own desire to fight Assad. The bombing of Al Nusra strengthens the position of the Assad regime. As former Navy Officer Christopher Harmer claims: “If the U.S. attacks Nusra without attacking Assad, all the average Syrian sees is that the U.S. is enabling, emboldening, and strengthening the Assad regime. It’s not that the Syrian people love Nusra; it’s that Nusra has been in the fight against Assad, and the U.S. has looked for every excuse to stay out of the fight against Assad.”
 The US denies that it is attacking al-Nusra. General Lloyd Austin the commander of US Central Command said of the widening air campaign: “There were no strikes conducted against the al Nusra front. We did conduct a number of strikes, and the strikes were focused on the Khorasan group.” However, the Khorasan insofar as they exist are simply part of the Nusra Front. The Khorasan theme is dutifully picked up by the media as with CNN which reports that David Drugeon an Al Qaeda bomb-maker was killed in the recent attacks. The report comes courtesy of an anonymous official but not to worry CNN assures us that the official has access to the latest information about the strikes: The U.S. military fired at a vehicle it believed carried David Drugeon, a skilled bomb-maker in his 20s who also has ties to core al Qaeda members in Pakistan, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
 The US policy in Syria is in disarray and any hopes of building an effective moderate force to carry out US policy of attacking the Islamic State seem to have been dashed by the recent bombing of Jabhat al-Nusra.
 Another factor in the Syrian civil strife is the relationship of the Kurds to the Assad government. From very early on Assad has left the Kurds alone except when they tried to expand their territory. Assad is not worried about Kurdish fighting the Islamic State since this does not threaten the regime's interests. Many other rebel groups are suspicious of the Kurdish position or even hostile to the Kurds since they are not confronting the Assad regime. Again in the western press they are the heroes fending off the Islamic State. While that is true enough it does not change the manner in which they relate to the Assad regime.

Two moderate Syrian rebel groups surrender to Al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front

Two of the main moderate rebel groups who had received weapons from the US have surrendered to the Al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front after defeats in battle.There are reports that Islamic State forces joined the Nusra Front in at least one attack.

When the US bombed Islamic State positions in Syria they also bombed Nusra Front positions claiming they were attacking a group called Khorasan said to be threatening attacks on the west. However, the result has been disastrous. Not only were almost all rebel groups furious but the move appears to have led to the Nusra Front cooperating with the Islamic State rather than fighting it along with other rebel groups. The Harakat Hazm and the Syrian Revolutionary Front were two major rebel groups to become part of the vetted moderate rebel forces chosen to fight the Islamic State. The Hazm movement had even received heavy weapons including Grad rockets and TOW anti-tank weapons and they had in turn supplied weapons to the Syrian Revolutionary Front(SRF).
 On Saturday, Jabhat al-Nusra or the Nusra Front stormed villages controlled by Hazm in the northern province of Idlib. The group surrendered their bases and weapons supplies to the group. A day earlier the Nusra Front had captured the home town of the Revolutionary Front's leader Jamal Marouf. The Nusra Front claims to have captured TOW missiles when it took over the home town of Marouf. His group fled into the mountains.
 Aymen al-Tammimi an analyst of the Syrian situation said:"As a movement, the SRF is effectively finished. Nusra has driven them out of their strongholds of Idlib and Hama." Marouf had become a prominent rebel leader praised in the west because he had launched the rebel offensive that had driven the Islamic State forces from most of the territory in two northern provinces they had wrested mostly from other rebel forces. Now jihadist forces linked to Al-Qaeda have driven him from his own strongholds into the mountains and taken over his home village. The US has from the beginning been wary of supplying any heavy weapons to the Syrian rebels in case they should end up in the hands of militant groups they oppose.
  Some reports indicate that Harakat Hazm simply decided to surrender to the Nusra Front without a shot being fired and that some members of Hazm joined the jihadist group. Even the moderate rebel groups were furious that the US is bombing groups fighting the Assad regime, especially Al Nusra Front who had been working with them. Even moderate rebels are primarily interested in the overthrow of Assad. The Hazm group still exists in Aleppo but only after they gave up some of their checkpoints to Al Nusra and signed a ceasefire agreement with them. One of the conditions for giving Hazm weapons was that the group would not work with Jabhat al-Nusra. The Al-Qaeda group felt that Hazm's close relations with the US made it a threat and that may be one of the reasons they attacked the group.
Obama announced that part of his fight against the Islamic State will involve training, arming, and equipping 5,000 Syrian rebels to fight against the Islamic State. The US appears to have completely misread the situation. The rigorous vetting process will take several months before training can even begin and it will be up to a year before the force is prepared to fight. Just last month a US official said that they would hasten the process by choosing rebels from groups already vetted. Included among those were Harakat Hazm.
 Apparently the operation rooms in Turkey that funnel weapons to rebels have been revamped and have representatives from the US, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. A Syrian source said that Qatar had been thrown out of the group over suspicions that it had been helping Jabhat al-Nusra but was being allowed back. The system for supplying weapons is complicated and is intended more to ensure that donor countries have confidence that the weapons were used for their proper purposes rather than providing effective aid to commanders. The US is intending to develop its own elite forces but these forces also could become victims of jihadist rebels who are interested only in attacking Assad and will only attack the Islamic State if IS attacks them.

Al Qaeda group in Yemen urges all jihadists to support the Islamic State

The Islamic State (IS) has been disowned by Al-Qaeda for not following orders. The Jabhat al-Nusra or Nusra Front is now recognized as the official representative of Al Qaeda in Syria.

Al-Qaeda disowned the Islamic State back in February of this year. IS was then known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria or the Levant (ISIS or ISIL) and earlier as Al Qaeda in Iraq. Now a branch of Al-Qaeda in Yemen, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula(AQAP) has issued a statement urging all jihadists to support the Islamic State against the United States. The call for solidarity is significant since the leader of AQAP is thought to have been appointed the "general manager" and deputy to Al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri. The AQAP statement said in part: "We urge all Muslims to back their brethren, with their souls, money and tongues, against the crusaders. We call on anyone who can wear down the Americans to strive to do so by military, economic or media means."
The expression of solidarity with IS from AQAP may be in part a result of US bombing raids in Syria. The US bombed the IS in Syria but it also bombed positions of what it called "Khorasan" near Aleppo. Khorasan is just a fancy name, invented by US intelligence, for a group within the Al Nusra front. Rebels of all descriptions were outraged by these bombings since the Nusra Front is cooperating with other rebel groups against the Assad regime and are key fighters in the Aleppo area. The US bombing of the Nusra Front may lead to the group also expressing solidarity with the Islamic State in time. Up to now there has been conflict between the two groups.
 If the Nusra Front decides to support the Islamic State this will make the US hopes of creating a force of moderate rebels to fight the IS and Assad a pipe dream. Indeed, the US plans are not yet even worked out with the Free Syrian Army only with exile political groups. Al-Qaeda rejects the IS declaration of a caliphate with Baghdadi as its head, however the AQAP statement insists that they are all brothers: "We urge all mujahidin to set aside their differences and inter-factional fighting and move instead against the crusade targeting all." Judging from the appended video Jabhat al-Nusra is not interested in recruiting cowboys.

Obama may have trouble finding his moderate Syrian rebels to train and arm

Obama's strategy for battling the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq envisions using proxy troops on the ground rather than US forces. In Iraq there are the Kurdish peshmerga and Iraqi forces.

Kurdish forces will also fight against the Islamic State in Syria. Obama intends to spend a half billion dollars to arm and train "moderate" rebels to carry out attacks against the Islamic State as well. After the House approved the bill it passed the Senate by a vote of 78-22. The vote was on a combined bill to fund the government and prevent a shutdown and this makes it unreliable as a measure of support for Obama's mission. However, many analysts doubt Obama will be able to find many rebels who will share the Obama vision of what should happen in Iraq.
 Even moderate rebels believe the first order of business should be defeating the Assad regime rather than fighting against the Islamic State. Moderate rebels were incensed that US bombing hit not only the Islamic State but also the Al Nusra Front an Al-Qaeda approved group that is cooperating with other rebels against the Assad regime. Few of the groups operating on the ground against Assad espouse liberal democratic values, but the Free Syrian Army has been considered a moderate group — at least in that the umbrella group is not explicitly fighting for an Islamist type state as are the Islamic Front, one of the larger rebel groups. However, as this Al Jazeera article points out, there are fatal flaws with the FSA: The FSA is currently the weakest force on the ground in Syria, a result not only of inadequate foreign backing compared with that of rival Islamist and extremist factions, but of its own internal divisions, byzantine leadership structure (based in Turkey) and rampant corruption. President Obama himself recently admitted it was a “fantasy” to believe a bunch of “doctors, farmers, pharmacists and so forth” ever had a chance of overthrowing the Moscow-backed regime of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad by themselves.
The FSA is an umbrella group composed of small sub-groups across Syria who fight under the FSA banner, but there is no clear chain of command nor cohesive ideology that unites them. The FSA continually loses fighters to other better-funded Islamist groups and even the Al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat Al Nusra and the Islamic State. When the FSA does take territory from Assad, it is usually through cooperation with more radical groups. Even when it has taken territory it often loses it, as happened in the north when the Islamic State or ISIL as it then was, simply took the area from the FSA.. Many analysts believe that Obama is interested only in ensuring that the rebel forces remain strong enough to force Assad to the bargaining table but not strong enough to defeat his forces.
 Joshua Landis of the University of Oklahoma said: “Frankly we’ve seen too many failed states fill up with jihadist militias. The FSA wouldn’t bring unified rule in Syria, they would bring Somalia, just like you’ve already got in the north.” However defenders of the FSA and the western-backed political group the Syrian National Coalition believe that better arms and training would solve the defection problems of the FSA and make it a stronger fighting force. Critics point out that the $500 million set aside for training and equipping moderate rebels is nowhere near what is thought to be required to combat Assad effectively. The US wants these rebels to fight the Islamic State first but even most members of the FSA oppose that. Abelnasr Farzat, a top FSA commander in the Aleppo area until last year but now based in Turkey said: “We must first eliminate the root cause of terrorism, and then the consequences of terrorism." While the US wants peace talks and political negotiations to end the conflict, very few FSA fighters would agree to this.
The US had a decade to train and arm the Iraqi army but the resulting forces were not up to combating determined Islamic State fighters. Even some US lawmakers opposed Obama's plans. Rand Paul, a Republican Senator from Kentucky said: "Intervention that destabilizes the Middle East is a mistake. And yet, here we are again, wading into a civil war." Senator Mark Begich, a Democrat from Alabama, also disagreed with Obama's policy and suggested that Arab countries should be leading the way in fighting the Islamic State. Begich nevertheless voted for the bill since he wanted to ensure that the government was funded.
 The proposal to choose moderate rebels and then arm and train them inspired the Borowitz Report in the New Yorker to create an application form to be submitted in order to receive weapons from the US that consists of a series of questions. Here is one:
  If I were given a highly lethal automatic weapon by the United States, I would: A) Only kill exactly the people that the United States wanted me to kill B) Try to kill the right people, with the caveat that I have never used an automatic weapon before C) Kill people only after submitting them to a rigorous vetting process D) Immediately let the weapon fall into the wrong hands
Obama's plans may also be foiled by rebels deciding to agree not to fight radical Islamists even the Islamic State as long as they join in fighting the Assad regime. There are reports of a truce being negotiated in at least one area already. After the US bombed not only the Islamic State but Al Nusra as well, there were many demonstrations not just in support of Al Nusra, the Al Qaeda-linked group that cooperates with the rebels but the Islamic State as well. An article in CounterPunch even suggests that the none of the groups of rebels in series of any significant size are not moderate, that there really are no moderate rebels.

US still considering a no fly zone over rebel-held areas of Syria

The U.S. public has been told that bombing raids in Syria were to attack the Islamic State and areas it occupies. It turns out that the US raids also attacked areas held by other radical Islamists such as Al Nusra Front.

The media also began to talk of a new threat the Khorasan who appear to be simply a group within the Al Qeda-linked Al Nusra Front. These attacks incensed rebels of all stripes since they are seen to be helping Assad and also targeted groups that cooperate with and are vital to the campaign against Assad. Even the Assad government which earlier had complained that the attacks violated Syrian sovereignty, the UN charter, and international law now applauded the attacks. While the US does intend to spend about half a billion training moderate rebels to fight against Assad and the Islamic State many rebels feel abandoned by the US. The US seems more interested in tackling the Islamic State than defeating the Assad forces in Syria.
 In a news conference at the Pentagon, General Dempsey, announced that a rebel force of about 12 to 15 thousand fighters would be required to defeat the Islamic State The current plan is to train 5,000 rebels. The training and arms will be provided by the US but will take place in Saudi Arabia. Dempsey said the 5,000 was not intended to be a ceiling. The US may intend to do even more to show that it supports the rebel cause.
 The New York Times had discussed the prospect of enforcing a no-fly zone back in July of 2013: "To establish buffer zones to protect parts of Turkey or Jordan to provide safe havens for Syrian rebels and a base for delivering humanitarian assistance would require imposing a limited no-fly zone and deploying thousands of American ground forces." The idea of a "no fly zone" is again being floated in an article in the New York Times using the same humanitarian theme that was offered up in the earlier suggestions a year ago. This was the same tactic that was used in Libya to degrade Gadaffi's military power and ultimately enabled rebels to overthrow his regime. However, this time a UN resolution is not involved. As Russia and others have maintained, the attacks are a clear violation of the UN charter and international law but that issue is not even worth mentioning let alone discussion in most of the mainstream media.
 The Times article describes the no-fly zone as follows:"The Obama administration has not ruled out establishing a no-fly zone over northeastern Syria to protect civilians from airstrikes by the Syrian government…Creating a buffer, or no-fly zone, would require warplanes to disable the Syrian government’s air defense system through airstrikes." This move would bring the US in direct conflict with Syrian jets and no doubt would require the destruction of Syrian air defense systems. This could very well result in direct conflict between the US and the Syrian government a situation that would please the Syrian rebels but might not be welcomed by the US. Russia and Iran could intervene to help Assad.
Of course civilians do die when Syria attacks rebel positions particularly when they use weapons such as barrel bombs. Interestingly though, US bombing also causes civilian deaths and the US has lowered its own standards for collateral damage as it steps up its attacks on the Islamic State in Syria. The Jerusalem Post reports: Already facing reports of high civilian deaths tolls early in its campaign against Islamic State, Caitlin Hayden from the National Security Council publicly lowered the administration’s standards on Tuesday, expecting collateral damage to mount in its fight against Islamic State in urban Syria. The “near certainty” required for counterterrorism strikes elsewhere, Hayden told The Jerusalem Post, only applies “when we take direct action ‘outside areas of active hostilities,’ as we noted at the time.”“That description – outside areas of active hostilities – simply does not fit what we are seeing on the ground in Iraq and Syria right now,” Hayden said. Indeed, much of the US and allies' bombing has targeted infrastructure such as oil fields and even grain silos.
 Even those that are not wounded or injured in Islamic State controlled territories face more miserable conditions caused not by the Islamic State but by bombing by the US and its allies. There seems little concern to protect Syrians who happen to be in territory taken by the Islamic State. If Obama was interested only in attacking the Islamic State he would have asked permission from Assad to carry out the strikes and gained the cooperation of Russia as well. Assad may find that future plans of the US in Syria include intervention that provides more help for the rebels. Although the US at present is hurting the rebel cause through their attacks on radical groups allied with them, in the future there may be more actions in Syria directed against Assad now that the US has directly acted within Syrian territory. As shown in the appended video, Turkey has now also suggested there be a no fly zone in Syria.