Iran
US, Iranian forces converge on Syria
Some 5,000 US troops are in Jordan to participate in the multi-national Eager Lion exercises—just as Iran is sending 4,000 Revolutionary Guards to support Syria's Bashar Assad.
Tag: Syria
Iraq
Nusra Front nixes merger with Iraq Qaeda franchise
Syria’s Nusra Front appealed to al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri to mediate in a dispute with the Islamic State of Iraq, rejecting the latter’s attempted hostile take-over.
Greater Middle East
Samantha Power signals Syria intervention?
Samantha Power’s appointment as UN ambassador may signal a determination on the part of the Obama administration that intervention in Syria is inevitable.
Greater Middle East
Lebanon’s hashish valley drawn into Syrian war
Lebanon’s hashish heartland of the Bekaa Valley is increasingly embroiled in the civil war raging across the border in Syria, with a wave of sectarian clashes and abductions.
Greater Middle East
‘Sunni cleansing’ in Syria?
Turkey sees in the battle for Qusayr a strategy to create an Alawite mini-state within Syria, purged of Sunni Muslims, to which the ruling elite can withdraw for a last stand.
Greater Middle East
Turkey to build wall on Syrian border
Turkey will build a 2.5-kilometer wall along the Cilvegözü post on the border with Syria, near where a twin bomb attack killed 51 and wounded more than 100 earlier this month.
Greater Middle East
Israeli air-strikes near Damascus
Israeli missiles struck a research center near Damascus, as massacres of Sunni families by pro-government militias are reported from Syria’s coastal Alawite stronghold.
Greater Middle East
Kurdish militia falls out with Free Syria Army
An alliance between the Free Syrian Army and the People’s Protection Committees (YPG), the country’s main Kurdish militia, broke down amid internecine clashes in Aleppo.
Greater Middle East
Has Syria crossed chemical ‘red line’?
Israel's claim that Syria has used chemical weapons comes as rebel militias have assumed positions near the line of control in the Golan Heights.
Greater Middle East
US pledges $100 million in aid to Syrian rebels
As the Friends of Syria summit opened in Istanbul, US Secretary of State John Kerry announced $100 million in new “non-lethal” aid to the Syrian opposition.
Iraq
Syria: Nusra Front merge with Iraq Qaeda wing
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, “emir” of al-Qaeda in Iraq, announced a merger with Syria’s Nusra Front to form a new organization, the “Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham.”
Greater Middle East
Syria: Alawite dissidents break with regime
Opposition activists from Syrian President Bashar Assad's Alawite sect publicly broke ranks with the regime at a meeting in Cairo, and urged their fellow Alawites in the army to rebel.