Free Republic

The Syrian people are exuberant about the end of the Bashar al-Assad regime. But there is one atrocity by this notorious family that has been described as “one of the darkest moments in the modern history of the Arab world.” That is the 1982 encirclement, starvation and mass execution of the residents of the Syrian city of Hama. This atrocity was committed by Bashar’s father, Hafez al-Assad. Last Friday, residents of Hama tore down the statue of Hafez al-Assad while the city fell to rebels. While much of the world just saw it as another Syrian city falling, its significance...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad flew out of Damascus for an unknown destination on Sunday, as rebels said they had infiltrated the capital with no sign of army deployments. Syrian army units abandoned their positions on the outskirts of Damascus on Saturday night, fleeing the advance of rebel forces. The military said it was “reinforcing” defensive lines around the capital, which appeared to have collapsed. Mohammed al-Rahmoun, the Syrian interior minister, earlier said there was a “very strong security cordon on the outskirts of Damascus and no one can break it”. But the Syrian opposition fighters early on Sunday disproved this,...

HTS rebel commander says forces have begun to enter Homs War monitors, the leader of the HTS fighters and pro-government media all reported late on Saturday that forces loyal to President Bashar Assad had largely withdrawn from the country's third city, Homs. The head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdurrahman, said Syrian troops and members of different security agencies had withdrawn from Homs, and that HTS forces had started to enter the suburbs.

Syrian opposition fighters have reached the suburbs of the Damascus capital for the first time since the region was recaptured by government troops in 2018, as president Bashar al-Assad's regime nears collapse. One resident said the city was on edge, with security forces on the streets and many shops running out of staple foods. The Syrian army withdrew from much of the country's south on Saturday but later said it was fortifying positions in the Damascus suburbs and in the south. Syria's state news agency denied reports that Assad had already fled to Russia claiming he continued to govern from...

Iran has reportedly started to withdraw troops from Syria as advancing rebel forces threaten to topple the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, according to The New York Times. Syrian insurgents took control of the central city of Hama following the retreat of government forces on Thursday, just days after rebels captured most of Aleppo, Syria's second largest city. Evacuations were initiated on Friday for commanders and personnel from the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force, according to Iranian officials and regional commanders cited in the Times report. Diplomatic staff serving at the Iranian Embassy in Damascus were also...

• Syrian rebels are speeding toward the major city of Homs, where residents are fleeing ahead of potential clashes between the rebels and regime forces. • The rebels seized Hama to the north on Thursday, the second major city taken from President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in just over a week of fighting. • A new uprising has also emerged in the southern Daraa province, with rebels there claiming to have taken a major military base and announcing that their “destination is Damascus.” • Russia’s embassy in Syria has urged its citizens to leave the country, citing “the difficult military and...

Tens of thousands of people are fleeing Syria's third-largest city Homs amid reports that rebels are closing in, just over a week since they launched their lightning offensive. The rebels seized Hama to the north on Thursday, a second major blow to President Bashar al Assad who lost control of Aleppo last week. The leader of the Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, told residents of Homs "your time has come". Rebel forces began the biggest offensive against Syria's government in years last week. They have been advancing south, and Homs would be the next stop...

Syrian rebels captured the key city of Hama on Thursday, bringing the insurgents a major victory after a lightning advance across northern Syria and dealing a new blow to President Bashar al-Assad and his Russian and Iranian allies. The Syrian army said it was redeploying outside the city "to preserve civilians lives and prevent urban combat" after what it called intense clashes. Rebels said they were preparing to keep marching south towards Homs, Syria's great crossroads city that links the capital Damascus to the north and coast. "Your time has come," said a rebel operations room in an online post,...

Syria claimed that its counteroffensive successfully pushed back insurgents attempting to advance toward the strategic city of Hama, while opposition forces reported capturing additional Syrian soldiers and Iran-backed militants in intense clashes. This latest flare-up in Syria's civil war follows recent gains by insurgents, including the capture of large areas in the northern city of Aleppo and towns in the southern part of Idlib province. The conflict between President Bashar Assad's government and armed opposition forces, which seek to overthrow him, has claimed an estimated half-a-million lives over the past 13 years. According to Syrian state media SANA, government forces,...

Syrian insurgents fighting forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have launched attacks in the central province of Hama, threatening to cut off government troops from a key route linking the capital, Damascus, with rebel-held Aleppo. The army was engaging in “violent confrontations” with armed groups in Hama, the Syrian state news agency, Sana, reported. Separately, a longtime independent war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said on Tuesday morning that rebel factions in the province had managed to seize several “towns in the last few hours”. “Syrian and Russian air forces carried out dozens of strikes on the area,”...

Iran-backed militants entered Syria yesterday to bolster dictator Bashar al-Assad’s regime against the Islamist rebels who seized Aleppo. Militias crossed into the war-torn country from neighbouring Iraq, following a lightning offensive against the Syrian army by rebel forces from the hardline Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and Turkish rebel groups. Their seizure of Aleppo, Syria’s second city, and swathes of territory in the north of the country has reignited the deadly civil war in Syria and shocked its allies in Russia and Iran. President Assad blamed the West for the ‘terrorist escalation’, and accused the US and its allies...

Russia and Iran have rushed to the aid of an embattled ally as the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad announced a counteroffensive against rebel groups that have scored stunning advances in the past 48 hours. Russian warplanes hit rebel-held targets in the northwest region of Idlib on Sunday as Iran’s foreign minister made an emergency trip to Damascus to demonstrate support for the Assad regime. Syrian jets also hit rebel-held areas of the cities of Aleppo and Idlib which have fallen to the insurgents’ lightning advance. The moves were a sign of the deep shock delivered to Mr. Assad,...

Three Republican members of the U.S. Congress made a quick trip Sunday into opposition-held northwest Syria in the first known visit to the war-torn country by American lawmakers in six years. They urged the Biden administration and regional partners to keep up the pressure on Syrian President Bashar Assad. The roughly one-hour stop was a signal of the significant support on Capitol Hill for the opposition in Syria’s long civil war.

Biden administration criticized for Syria mixed messaging Why the Arab League's decision to bring back Assad has 'destroyed' US leverage in Syria Middle East Institute senior fellow Charles Lister discusses the significance of the Arab League's decision to welcome Syria back into the multilateral body and the Biden administration's response to Arab states' re-engagement. Syrian President Bashar Assad appeared at an Arab League summit in Saudi Arabia for the first time in more than a decade Friday after his country was expelled in 2011 for its brutal crackdown on peaceful pro-democracy protests during the Arab Spring.

PARIS — Marat Gabidullin's face is lined from years of exposure to the elements, and his hair is thinning. But at 56, he has the trim physique and muscular arms of a man 30 years younger. He wears a chunky ring bearing the image of a skull.The skull is the symbol of the Wagner Group — a private Russian mercenary force believed to be financed by an oligarch with close ties to President Vladimir Putin. The group is fighting alongside the Russian army in Ukraine's eastern Donbas region. And it's widely believed that at least some of the "little green...

In late 2016, Syrian government forces had sealed off Aleppo's rebel-held eastern half, with 270,000 people inside, and for months they and Russian warplanes blasted it to rubble. Food was scarce. .. Hashem and other Aleppo survivors on Tuesday mark the 11th anniversary of Syria’s revolution-turned-civil war. This year, many of them are not just reflecting on their own fates, they are watching in shock as Ukrainians face familiar horrors: bombardment, brutal siege and flight from their homes. In Syria's war, Russia helped President Bashar Assad's government gain the upper hand with a ruthless strategy. One by one, they locked...

In the Hadash party, Russia and Putin are "victims" of Ukraine, which is generally aggressive. The Hadash party defends the small and attacked country, Russia The left-wing Hadash party de facto stands to the right of Vladimir Putin. This is an event reminiscent of their historic support for the tyrannical Syrian ruler, Bashar Assad, who murdered his people with terrible cruelty with the help of the Russians. Although every reference of this party begins with a "no no no" to Putin, with a statement of "yes to peace and no to war" but at the end come the statements and...

Since the Democrats took control of the White House and both Houses of Congress a hundred days ago, the Middle East has become a powder keg. But Israel's ruling class sees nothing. In Afghanistan and Iraq, violent attacks against US forces are rising steeply. From January through April, attacks on US forces increased 40%. President Joe Biden's announcement that the US will withdraw its forces from the country by September 11, the 20th anniversary of the jihadist attacks on the US worsened the situation by communicating a message of profound American weakness and defeatism. The Taliban, al-Qaida and Iran clearly...

"We're doing it simultaneously. In Russia they decided to do the clinical trial in parallel and collect the data, as is customary in the West, as well as allowing in some cases that we call 'compassion treatments' for some patients" Those words from Dr. Zeev Rotstein, director of Hadassah Hospital in Israel, getting into the details of what's really going on as Russia has announced that its developed the first effective coronavirus vaccine..... Omaha City Council voting unanimously to impose an emergency mask-muzzle order for indoor public places..... Law enforcement in Belarus using live ammunition on people protesting last Sunday's...

A complete and total collapse of oil prices today to below zero levels...... Syrian media report an Israeli air strike on the central city of Palmyra tonight.... After an additional buildup of Turkish military forces in northwestern Syria over the weekend the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdgoan accusing the Syrian government of violating the cease-fire in the Greater Idlib region. He said the Syrian government would face 'heavy losses' if the violations continued. The "Al Masdar" news website reporting Syrian government shelling of jihadist positions in Idlib.... The Iranian Foreign Minister visited Damascus today.... An attack on a US military...