Expelled from Deir Ezzor
Rival opposition groups including the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al-Nusra Front expel ISIS from the province of Deir Ezzor. The oil-producing province is also a key conduit for weapons across the Iraqi border. The Al-Nusra Front, which has largely stayed out of conflicts with ISIS, joined about 10 other militant groups to expel the extremist faction.
Claims Lebanon suicide bombing
Syrian Al Qaeda offshoot the Al-Nusra Front claims a suicide bombing in Lebanon. The car bomb targeting an army post in Hezbollah-controlled area kills two Lebanese soldiers and a civilian and leaves 17 wounded. Prime Minister Tammam Salam, the government’s highest-ranking Sunni official says the attack constitutes an act of terrorism:
The attack on the military establishment exceeds a normal crime. We urge everybody to unite
Senior militant killed
A senior Iraqi intelligence official says senior ISIS leader Haji Bakr has been assassinated in a killing related to the dispute between ISIS and other opposition groups. Haji Bakr’s real name was Sameer Abid Mohammed Al-Halefawi, and he is reported to have served as an air-defense officer in Saddam Hussein’s army before joining Al Qaeda in Iraq after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
Withdraws from Aleppo
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that ISIS’s headquarters in Aleppo have been overtaken by rival opposition:
Fighters from several Islamist rebel brigades took control of the children’s hospital in the Qadi Askar district, which is the headquarters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in the city.
The extremist group has effectively abandoned the area:
ISIL withdrew from the Inzarat area after clashes with fighters from rebel… brigades, and the post office building was taken over by Islamist rebel fighters … There are hardly any ISIL members left in the city of Aleppo.
‘Crush other rebels’
ISIS calls on its fighters to destroy rival opposition groups in an audio message from spokesman Abu Mohammad al-Adnani:
Crush them totally and kill the conspiracy at birth
A warning to the rebels:
None of you will remain, and we will make of you an example to all those who think of following the same path
Ousted from Aleppo, Idlib
Rival opposition factions strike back at ISIS after its moves to seize territory they have claimed from regime forces in Aleppo and Idlib provinces. Raqqa-based Sham News Network media activist Abu Bakr:
The rebels have achieved tremendous progress against ISIS in all the points of conflict, liberating more than 80% of the Idlib countryside and 65% of Aleppo and its countryside
Mohammad Hassano, an activist in the town of Azaz:
People just couldn’t take it anymore, after all the kidnapping and arrests and attacks against the [Free Syrian Army]. People were very angry at them, but there was hesitation in fighting them because of the priority of fighting the regime.
Henning abducted
Henning is abducted 30 minutes after the aid convoy he is traveling with crosses the border from Turkey into Syria, a journey of only four miles. He had insisted on joining the convoy of former NHS ambulances delivering defibrillators, stethoscope sand oxygen to a hospital in Idlib instead of remaining at home in Eccles, Greater Manchester, with his wife and two children. Convoy organiser Kasim Jameel, a taxi driver from Bolton:
Alan is a man who is full of compassion and we are just praying to Allah that he is released safe and sound. We are liaising with the authorities and we do not want to say anything which might put him in any further jeopardy or which will inflame the situation. I could tell a lot of stories about the good that Alan has done and about how, as a non Muslim, he has helped Muslims who have suffered in the conflict. He is motivated to help others – not just by helping the convoy but by loads of other things as well. He is the nicest of nice guys who has done so much to help other people. He is just a normal bloke, an everyday taxi driver who wanted to do good. We are thinking about him all the time and praying that he will be allowed home to his family.
Bolton aid convoy
Volunteers from the Greater Manchester area join an aid convoy of 20 former NHS ambulances to a hospital in Idlib in northwestern Syria. The convoy leaves Oakley Avenue in Great Lever, Bolton, to make the 4,000-mile journey to deliver the ambulances loaded with medical equipment that includes defibrillators, stethoscopes and oxygen content. Volunteer Kasim Jameel, from Farnworth, organised the convoy along with eight other volunteers from Bolton and the UK Arab Society. The group includes taxi driver Alan Henning, from Eccles in Greater Manchester. The trip is made in memory of Abbas Khan, the UK orthopedic surgeon who was arrested by Abbas security forces and died in custody earlier in December. The group carry signs saying ‘RIP Abbas Khan’ and one saying ‘Syria is calling we will answer’.
UN implicates Assad in war crimes
The UN’s human rights chief says an inquiry has produced evidence that war crimes are authorised in Syria at the highest level, including by President Assad. Commissioner Pillay says her office holds a list of others implicated by the inquiry. Pillay:
[The enquiry has produced] massive evidence… [of] very serious crimes, war crimes, crimes against humanity. The scale of viciousness of the abuses being perpetrated by elements on both sides almost defies belief. [The evidence indicates responsibility] at the highest level of government, including the head of state
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Mekdad is dismissive of Pillay’s remarks.
She has been talking nonsense for a long time and we don’t listen to her.
Captured in Syria
0 0 reuben reuben2014-10-22 17:06:492015-01-17 11:41:42Captured in SyriaCaptures town from rival opposition
ISIS fighters seize the northern town of Azaz near the Turkish border from Free Syrian Army forces, causing confusion among the ranks of the opposition. FSA spokesman Loay al-Mikdad says the group took the town from Assad regime forces in self-defence and questions why ISIS are storming an area that is already ‘liberated’:
They said they came to defend the Syrian people. Now they have turned their guns away from fighting the regime to fighting the Syrian people.
Asked to leave northern town
Six of Syria’s main rebel factions ask ISIS to withdraw from the town of Azaz, near the Turkish border, which it captured several days earlier from Free Syrian Army rebels. The statement asks “our brothers in ISIL to withdraw their troops and vehicles to their main headquarters immediately” and implement an “immediate ceasefire” in the area. Signed by the Ahrar al-Sham, Liwa al-Tawhid and Jaysh al-Islam factions, and the smaller Suqur al-Sham, Furqan Brigades and Liwa al-Haq groups, it comes hours after the group clashes with the mainstream Northern Front Alliance and sends fighters towards a border post. ISIS and the Northern Front are asked to…
…resort immediately to the Islamic court, which will remain in session in Aleppo for 48 hours
Syria sarin attack report
60 Minutes reports on an August 2103 Sarin nerve gas attack in Damascus, Syria. U.S. intelligence estimates that is kills 1,429 civilians, including 426 children.
Nobody knew what was going on. People were just praying for God to have mercy on them. Sir, I’ve seen things you wouldn’t even dream about in your worst nightmares
It just took seconds before I lost my ability to breathe. I felt like my chest was set on fire. My eyes were burning like hell. I wasn’t able even to scream or to do anything. So I started to beat my chest really hard. It was so painful. It felt like somebody was tearing up my chest with a knife made of fire.
Returns to Syria
Cantlie decides to return to Syria to continue reporting:
This is what I do.
After being smuggled into northern Syria by rebel activists, Cantlie captures the situation in Idlib province first hand as President Assad’s forces continued to try and crush the rebels.
‘Itching to get back’ to Syria
Cantlie says he is eager to return to Syria despite his abduction.
I am itching to get back out there. The only thing stopping me is my cameras, as I lost them out there and need to buy some more.
Secret military base
Sources in the Persian Gulf tell Reuters that Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have set up a secret ‘nerve centre’ near the Turkish border with Syria to direct military aid and communications to Syrian rebels fighting the government. Doha source:
It’s the Turks who are militarily controlling it. Turkey is the main co-ordinator/facilitator. Think of a triangle, with Turkey at the top and Saudi Arabia and Qatar at the bottom. The Americans are very hands-off on this. U.S. intel are working through middlemen. Middlemen are controlling access to weapons and routes.
The centre is located in the southern Turkish city of Adana, about 100 km (60 miles) from the border, and was set up after Saudi Deputy Foreign Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Abdullah al-Saud visited Turkey and requested it. The Turks liked the idea of having the base in Adana so that they could supervise its operations.
Freed by FSA
Cantlie and Oerlemans are freed by members of the Free Syrian Army. Oerlemans:
[The FSA] started dressing down everyone, [asking] why the hell we were being kept there, how long we had been kept there, why we were being treated in this way.
They are driven out of the camp while the FSA shoot into the air. Oerlemans on the group’s ideology:
Where the FSA seems to be fighting for democracy, these foreign fighters don’t want anything more than imposing sharia on Syria. Syrians are pretty moderate Muslims in general, but they want to put them under the boot of sharia law.
Treated by NHS doctor
Cantlie is treated for his gunshot wounds by a British doctor using an NHS medical kit. He suffers nerve damage in his left arm.The man says he is 28 years old and has a wife and child in Britain. Cantlie:
When he told me he was an NHS doctor, I thought it was weird. This is a man who has taken an oath to save people and help them, and here he is walking around with a Kalashnikov and preaching sharia law. There are not any doctors who I know that do that.
Cantlie says the doctor is from south London and wants to treat trauma cases when he returns to Britain.
Shot during escape attempt
Cantlie and Oerlemans attempt to escape on the second day of their captivity, but are shot by the jihadists. Cantlie:
I ended up running for my life, barefoot and handcuffed while British jihadists — young men with south London accents — shot to kill. They were aiming their Kalashnikovs at a British journalist, Londoner against Londoner in a rocky landscape that looked like the Scottish Highlands.
Cantlie is shot in the arm while Oerlemans is shot in the foot and thigh.
Kidnapped in Syria
Cantlie and Oerlemans are kidnapped in Syria after crossing the Turkish border at Bab al Halwa. Their guide unintentionally leads them to a jihadi camp, where between 30-100 fighters from Bangladesh, Britain, Chechnya, and Pakistan are based. They are told that if they can prove they are journalists they will be let go, but are then accused of being spies. The group’s allegiance is not clear. Oerlemans:
They were definitely quite extreme in their religious beliefs. All day we were spoken to about the Koran and how they would bring Shariah law to Syria. I don’t think they were Al Qaeda; they seemed too amateurish for that. They said, ‘We’re not Al Qaeda, but Al Qaeda is down the road.’