PHOTO: President Assad: “After Russian intervention, situation has changed in very good way”

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Syria & Lebanon Analysis: Hezbollah Faces a Crisis of Legitimacy

Syria’s President Assad continued his PR offensive on Sunday, with his third interview with a foreign media outlet in a week.

In the broadcast by China’s Phoenix TV, Assad continued his effort to push back any process that could replace him — including the elections proposed by his allies Iran and Russia — and, in contrast to his concern this summer, proclaimed that the Syrian military is willing on all fronts.

See Syria Feature: Assad “It’s My Right To Run in Elections — If They Happen”

The President repeated his mantra that it is up to the “Syrian people” where he continues his 15-year hold on power, but said that “you cannot talk about something that’s going to happen maybe in the next few years”.

Assad said that the process for a new Constitution, with a referendum approving it, could be completed within two years. However, this would only begin after the total defeat of “terrorists”, the President’s term for Syrian rebels.

Most of the President’s answers repeated his long-time blame of all of Syria’s problems on foreign-supported “terrorism” — asked about his own responsibility, he said only that “we trust[ed] many” who turned out to work for “other states” — but he made sure that he backed Russia’s political and military intervention, with bombing since September 30 and support of the Syrian military’s ground offensives:

Before the Russian participation started about two months ago, it had been more than a year the American — what they call “American alliance” — started their campaign against the terrorists, but the result is that the terrorists have gained more ground and more recruits from around the world.

During the first month of the Russian participation, the same terrorists groups have been retreating and fleeing Syria in thousands to Turkey then to other countries; some to Europe, some to Yemen, and other areas. So, this is the fact.

Assad continued his praise of Moscow to put pressure on Washington: “You cannot fight terrorism through air raids. You need troops on the ground. The Americans only fight through their airplanes.”

The President denied that there was any significant “opposition”, although there might be some individuals who were acceptable opponents because they “stood against the terrorists and supported their government”. He assured:

After the participation of the Russian air forces in fighting terrorism, the situation has improved in a very good way, and now I can say that the army is making advancement in nearly every front — although front is not very precisely defined — but let’s say in many different directions and areas on the Syrian ground.

Since the conclusion of the second set of international talks in Vienna on November 14, Assad has also spoken with Italian TV and a French magazine.

Reports: Rebel Counter-Offensive Advancing South of Aleppo

Reports are circulating that rebels are advancing in a counter-offensive south of Aleppo city.

Activists and journalists say that the rebel coalition Jaish al-Fateh has taken Kafr Haddad, Tal al-Bakarah, Tel Mamou (see map) and Aziziyah (see map) and is attacking Banes to the northwest.

A pro-regime site confirms the claims.

The attack on Banes:

Footage from the battlefield:

Claimed anti-tank missile strike on regime troops:

Strike on a regime vehicle with troops and a rocket launcher in Aziziyah:

Led by Iranian troops, Hezbollah fighters, and Iraqi militia, a regime offensive had taken territory south of Aleppo this month, including the town of al-Hadher, and closed on the Aleppo-to-Damascus highway.

Jaish al-Fateh has promised a counter-offensive, with thousands of troops from Idlib and Hama Provinces, to reclaim the area.

Video of Iraqi militia in al-Hadher could indicate that the rebel advance has reached the town:

Storming of a hill southeast of al-Hadher (see map):

Reports: Kurdish Militia YPG Move Into Rebel Areas in Northern Aleppo

Pro-opposition activists and journalists reported on Monday that the Kurdish militia YPG moved into rebel-held areas in northern Aleppo Province, cutting the road between the border town of Azaz and Dayr Jamal.

The Aleppo Media Center warned civilians against travel in the area, saying a car was hit by YPG fire, wounding one person.

The Kurdish militia later withdrew from the area, according to a pro-opposition journalist.

Head of Iran’s Militia: “We Have Sent No Troops to Syria”

The commander of Iran’s Basij militia, General Mohammad Reza Naqdi, has insisted that no Iranian troops have been sent into Syria.

Naqdi said in an interview on State TV on Sunday night:

The Basij and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps play an advisory role in the resistance fronts and they are transferring their experiences to the fighters and this need is felt more in Syria and less in Iraq.

We help the two countries at the request of their armies and we are just transferring our experience, but haven’t sent any forces to these states.

At least 60 Iranian commanders and fighters have been killed since October 7, as they accompanied — and sometimes led — the Assad regime’s offensives against rebels and the Islamic State in northwest Syria.

However, the Secretary of the National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, and the deputy commander of the Revolutionary Guards, General Hossein Salami, both said Iranian units had not been deployed on the battlefield. Salami did say that the troops might be despatched if requested by the Assad regime.

Video: Regime Frees 6 Women in Return for Bodies of Slain Troops

Footage of the exchange of six women, held in regime jails, for the bodies of Syrian troops killed in Morek in northern Hama Province:

Located on the Hama-to-Aleppo highway, Morek was captured by a rebel counter-offensive in early November.

Obama to Russia: Rethink to Focus on Islamic State

US President Barack Obama has again asked Russia to focus on the Islamic State in its military intervention in Syria.

Obama told a news conference in Malaysia on Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin was realizing that ISIS “poses a greater threat to them than anything else in the region”:

The question at this point is whether they can make the strategic adjustment that allows them to be effective partners with us and the other 65 countries who are already part of the counter-ISIL [Islamic State] campaign. And we don’t know that yet.

Obama’s special envoy Brett McGurk said yesterday that US special forces arrive “very soon” in Syria to “suffocate and strangle” ISIS.

Speaking on national TV, McGurk declined to say when the special forces would be deployed. Obama announced in late October that the US would send 50 special troops into northern Syria.

The envoy said:

We’re going to pressure them and strangle them in the core. And that means all around Iraq and Syria. And we’re doing that by cutting offer their final 98-kilometer [61-mile] stretch of border they have with Turkey.

The Obama Administration has been sending arms to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces as they advance against the Islamic State in northeastern Syria. US officials have pressed the Kurds to lead an offensive on the ISIS center of Raqqa, but Kurdish political and military leaders have preferred to secure their areas along the Turkish and Iraq borders and the Euphrates River.

Iraq Suspends Flights Amid Russian Cruise Missile Attacks on Syria

Iraq has suspended flights from Monday to Wednesday between Baghdad and the northern cities of Erbil and Sulaimaniya, amid Russian cruise missile and bombers from the Caspian Sea across Iraqi airspace into Syria.

Iraq’s civil aviation authority said the step would “protect travelers and because of the crossing of cruise missiles and bombers in the northern part of Iraq launched from the Caspian Sea”.

Russia launched cruise missile attacks from the Caspian on October 7, covering about 1,500 km (900 miles) to hit rebel-held areas of northwest Syria. It renewed the missile strikes, as well as introducing long-range bombers, last week.

Lebanon began diverting flights last week after a request by the Russian navy, which is carrying out attacks from the eastern Mediterranean.

After End of 2 1/2-Year Siege, Soldiers From Kweires Airbase Meet Relatives and Friends

Regime troops from the Kweires Airbase, freed from an Islamic State siege earlier this month, meet relatives and friends in Tartous in western Syria:

Located east of Aleppo, Kweires was initially surrounded by rebels and then from early 2014 by the Islamic State. A regime offensive broke through and established contact in an important symbolic victory for the Syrian military and President Assad.

100s of Syrian Kurds Protest Alleged Abuses by Kurdish Party PYD

Hundreds of displaced Syrian Kurds in a northern Iraq refugee camp demonstrated on Saturday against alleged abuses by Syria’s Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in the north of the country.

The protest claimed conscription of men aged 18 to 30 was a policy that “forces many youth who refuse to take part in the battles to flee”, according to one citizen journalist. He said those who do not wish to serve “are internally displaced or go with their families to Iraq and Turkey”.

The demonstration was organized and attended by representatives of the Kurdish National Council, a coalition of Syrian Kurdish parties aligned with the Iraqi Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).

The KNC and PYD have clashed over administration of Kurdish-controlled territories, including conscription, primary school curricula, and alleged arrests of KNC-aligned demonstrators and activists by PYD security forces.

Reports: Rebels Kill Dozens of Islamic State-Affiliated Fighters in South

Pro-opposition activists are claiming that rebels have killed dozens of Islamic State-affiliated fighters in southern Syria.

At least 30 men died in the attack by the Jaish al-Fatah coalition in Daraa Province on the Shohada al-Yarmouk brigade, according to the reports.

Last Monday, a suicide attack by the Islamist faction Jabhat al-Nusra assassinated the leader of Shohada al-Yarmouk, Muhammad al-Baridi, along with several members of his leadership.

Jaish al-Fateh then set a 24-hour deadline for the brigade’s fightersto turn themselves in and “avoid bloodshed”.