LATEST
- Rebels Announce End of Negotiations Over Zabadani, Resume Attacks on Regime Elsewhere
- A Shift by Moscow? Russia’s Foreign Minister Lavrov Discusses Assad’s Future with Opposition Leader
- Medical NGO: 11 Killed by Regime Airstrikes on Hospitals in Idlib Province
- Regime Forces Try to Storm Hama Central Prison After Takeover By Detainees
US officials, supporting the statements of Kurdish officials, claim the Islamic State may have carried out a chemical attack on Kurdish fighters in northern Syria two weeks ago.
If confirmed, the use of mustard gas would be the first established chemical assault by a force other than the Assad regime in the 4 1/2-year Syrian conflict.
The Pentagon said Friday that it is also investigating a possible mustard gas attack this week on Kurdish fighters in neighboring northern Iraq.
Quoting officials, Kurdish news media said on Friday that mortars fired on Kurdish peshmerga in the town of Makhmur contained the chemical, with fighters displaying breathing problems and skin injuries.
“The result of the test revealed they have used mustard gas,” Brigadier General Sirwan Barzani said.
Barzani said a mortar barrage late Wednesday carried a gas his fighters had not seen before in ISIS attacks. He said the Peshmerga affected by the chemical agent had breathing problems and skin injuries consistent with mustard gas.
Barzani said a team of US and French experts collected samples to explain what could have caused the burns and breathing difficulties.
US Central Commander spokesman Colonel Patrick Ryder told reporters Friday, “We’ve seen those reports and we’re taking them seriously. At this point, we really don’t know what, if anything, may have been used.”
Two unnamed American officials said the defense and intelligence community believed the Makhmur report was “plausible” because of the suspicion of use in northern Syria, injuring several Kurdish fighters.
Hundreds of old and often corroded mustard artillery shells remained in Iraq after the 2003 US invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
Kurds have been on the offensive against the Islamic State since January, when they defeated a four-month effort by the militants to take the Kurdish center of Kobane on the Turkish center. By June, the Kurds — assisted by Free Syrian Army units and airstrikes by a US-led coalition — had closed a 90-km (56-mile) gap between the Kobane and Cezire cantons.
Peshmerga and the FSA then moved south on the Islamic State’s main center of the city of Raqqa, with the frontline of fighting near the town of Sarrin, captured last month by the Kurdish-FSA force.
Meanwhile, Syrian rebels have been in a battle with the Islamic State further to the west along the Turkish border. The Islamic State had taken several villages near the town of Mare’ in Aleppo Province earlier this week; however rebels counter-attacked, with the first supporting airstrike by the US-led coalition inside Syria since intervention began last September.
See Syria Feature: Supported by Coalition and Turkey, Rebels Advance Against Islamic State
Rebels advancing on the ground after a “hell cannon” attack in Um Hosh, east of Mare’:
In the latest development, the Islamic State launched an attack on the village of Talayn on Saturday — intense clashes are reportedly continuing this afternoon.
Rebels Announce End of Negotiations Over Zabadani, Resume Attacks on Regime Elsewhere
Rebels have announced the end of negotiations over the future of Zabadani, the town northwest of Damascus which has been under a six-week assault by Hezbollah and the Syrian military.
Ahrar al-Sham, the faction speaking for the rebels, said discussions had been ended with the Iranians representing the Assad regime. Ahrar al-Sham said the Iranians had insisted on a full evacuation of all residents of Zabadani and its outskirts.
Ahrar al-Sham’s spokesman said on Twitter:
Negotiations with Iran broke down Forced sectarian migration will not be tolerated Syria is an indivisible whole
#Zabadani
#الموت_ولا_المذله
— أبو عز الدين (@LabibAlNahhas) August 15, 2015
The talks have linked the future of Zabadani to that of two regime enclaves, Fu’ah and Kafraya, north of Idlib city in northwestern Syria.
Ahrar al-Sham’s cut-off of talks was followed by attacks on Fu’ah and Kafraya as well on Hezbollah and Assad forces in Zabadani.
The rebel faction Jaish al-Islam also moved on regime positions in the Damascus suburbs, including the town of Harasta to the northeast of the capital.
Activists said residents in Zabadani, 31 km (19 miles) northwest of Damascus, issued a statement that they will fight rather than leave their homes: “All we ask is to live in freedom or die in honor of protecting it.”
Footage of Jaish al-Islam’s attack in Harasta — soon after filming this, cameraman Abu Adnan Mayasa was killed:
A Shift by Moscow? Russia’s Foreign Minister Lavrov Discusses Assad’s Future with Opposition Leader
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has discussed the future of President Assad with a Syrian opposition leader in Moscow.
Russian State outlet TASS’s top story, on its English-language site, is the declaration by Haitham al-Mana’a that the system of State power must change:
No one in the world thinks Syria will in the future have the same system of administration it has now, with Bashar Assad in power. As for now, we’re beginning with the people we have around us.
A writer and former spokesman for the Arab Commission for Human Rights, Mana’a helped create the domestically-based National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change in 2011. He now lives in Paris.
He was among the participants this spring in a Cairo conference searching for a process for political resolution of the 4 1/2-year conflict.
Another Cairo participant, Jihad Makdisi, told TASS that Friday’s discussions supported a road map for political negotiations, a national charter, and implementation of a 2012 Geneva communique “so that we could get over to a political transitional period in Syria”.
He continued:
This is far from the first meeting. We’re maintaining contacts with Russia so as to see how Moscow could influence the Syrian authorities to step up the political dialogue and activities in line with the Geneva communique.
Medical NGO: 11 Killed by Regime Airstrikes on Hospitals in Idlib Province
Regime warplanes killed 11 people in targeted strikes on hospitals in Idlib Province in northwest Syria in the past week, Medecins Sans Frontieres said on Friday.
Three hospital workers were among the dead and 31 others were injured between August 7 and 10.
At least five hospitals were hit in Idlib, almost all of which is held by rebels, acccording to local activists.
“These attacks…indicate an increasing pattern of healthcare structures and civilians being affected as a result of the ongoing war,” MSF said.
Idlib’s hospitals and infrastructure have been repeatedly bombed since the provincial capital Idlib city was taken by rebels in March.
Regime Forces Try to Storm Hama Central Prison After Takeover By Detainees
Regime forces have tried to storm Hama Central Prison after detainees took over part of the facility on Friday.
An opposition site claimed an uprising by up to 1,300 prisoners over conditions and detention without trial.
The regime called up reinforcements from pro-Assad militia while the army used tear gas in an attempt to regain control.
In June, almost 700 detainees went on a hunger strike over the imposition of harsh sentences, including death penalties. The strike was ended after the regime made concessions.
Claimed footage of the detainees:
