Posted on 04/29/2017 5:26:58 PM PDT by Lorianne
Hay’at Tahrir al Sham (“Assembly for the Liberation of the Levant”) and the Islamic State have released competing propaganda claims from the Yarmouk camp in the southern part of Damascus this week. The two sides have battled each other for control of the camp, which was once home to more than 100,000 Syrians and Palestinian refugees, for more than two years. But the fighting continues to rage on.
Hay’at Tahrir al Sham (HTS) is a joint venture of several organizations that was formed in January. It includes the group formerly known as Al Nusrah Front, al Qaeda’s branch in the country. On Apr. 24, the propaganda arm for HTS, Ebaa News Agency, released three images purportedly showing a “network of tunnels dug by the Kharijites” that led underneath the areas of Yarmouk controlled by HTS. The Islamic State’s foes often call Abu Bakr al Baghdadi’s men “Kharijites,” a derogatory reference that is intended to compare them to Muslim forces that rebelled against authorities early in Islamic history.
Ebaa claimed that the HTS jihadists worked their way through the Islamic State’s tunnels, “engaged” and “expelled” Baghdadi’s loyalists, and then “controlled” the tunnels. The self-declared caliphate likely intended to use the network of underground passages to detonate a bomb underneath HTS’ positions or launch other raids deep behind enemies’ lines.
On Apr. 27, the Islamic State countered with its own set of twelve propaganda images, which document the door-to-door street clashes in Yarmouk. The group also released a statement claiming that more than 10 members of the “apostate” HTS had been killed in an inghimasi operation. “After relying on Allah, the soldiers of the caliphate launched an attack on positions of the apostate Hay’at Tahrir al Sham in the Yarmouk Camp south of Damascus,” the statement read. The inghimasi fighters “surprised the apostates from three axes” and three of the “brothers…detonated their explosive vests amid their [HTS] groups.” The Islamic State also said “clashes took place” that resulted in Baghdadi’s men “taking control over two residential blocks.”
SNIP, see article for more including photos
I guess John McCain & Little Lindsay Graham will have to flip a coin to see which they will continue to support.
There is no real difference among the Islamic groups. The only significant difference is their notion of who is to be in charge.
Such it will always be in Islam, with competing Caliphs warring against each other until one is finally supreme, and even then there will be rebellions among Muslims.
All true. Our best strategy is divide and conquer. Let them fight it out, then kill off the winner.
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