Anna Nolan: "These burning tyres are saving lives than billions of dollars spent on the 'war in syria' refuse to.
300,000 people are under siege in Aleppo. Cut out from food and medicine and penned in on all sides Russian and Regime jets are dropping barrels bombs and missiles on trapped civilians.
For years Syrian heroes like the White Helmets and medics have asked for a no-fly zone to stop these brutal attacks from the air. Their calls have been ignored.
As a last resort they are now burning tyres to create smoke so the fighter jets cannot see the hospitals, schools and homes they like to target.
Yet again Syrians are left saving themselves."
Rami Jarrah: "Resistance groups in Aleppo have began a mass operation that has already gained significant territory from Assad's forces. Rebel groups claim that 1km of advance is left to break the siege of Aleppo. Blue area are those that resistance groups in besieged Aleppo (green) have taken from Assad's forces (red)."
'Hillary Clinton will order a "full review" of the United States' strategy on Syria as a "first key task" of her presidency, resetting the policy to emphasise the "murderous" nature of the Assad regime, foreign policy adviser with her campaign has said.
Jeremy Bash, who served as chief of staff for the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency, said Mrs Clinton would both escalate the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and work to get Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, "out of there".
"A Clinton administration will not shrink from making clear to the world exactly what the Assad regime is," he said in an exclusive interview with The Telegraph. "It is a murderous regime that violates human rights; that has violated international law; used chemical weapons against his own people; has killed hundreds of thousands of people, including tens of thousands of children."
Mr Obama has been roundly criticised by top experts and members of his own administration for instating an approach to the Syrian war - which has seen estimates of more than 400,000 people killed - that is riven with contradictions.
The White House remains notionally committed to removing Mr Assad, whilst at the same time, working in alliance with Russia, Damascus' top champion. As America switches its focus to destroying Isil and creating alliances with Moscow, the White House has quietly dropped its rhetoric against the Assad regime. Critics warn that this approach will only foster anti-American sentiment among Syrians, who feel abandoned by the United States following its failure to take decisive action against Damascus.
A source with access to White House officials said the administration sees the dangers that partnering with Russia could have in terms of worsening the dynamics on the ground, but that the president is trying to cover his bases until he steps down in November. The source said the White House feels it cannot not be seen to be doing nothing against an Al-Qaeda affiliate at a time of heightened national security in America. Were there to be an attack in the US that was claimed by Al-Qaeda the president's legacy would be destroyed, they fear.'
'Few political movements have a harder case to make to the world, or to the American public and its leaders, than Syria’s secular opposition. And few movements have more reason to feel discouraged or abandoned right now. An organization like the Syrian American Council, for example, faces a morass in both Syria and Washington, D.C., pleading the ever-imperiled case for supporting democracy in Syria even as the conflict worsens and attention to situation flags in the U.S. A collection of non-jihadist rebel groups was recently encircled by the Syrian army in their former stronghold in Aleppo, and are coping with a number of steep geopolitical hurdles outside the country: the perception of Assad as a partner in fighting terrorism, the widespread conflation of the Syrian opposition with Sunni jihadism, a U.S. administration wary of antagonizing the pro-Assad Iranian regime and seemingly set on brokering the opposition’s surrender, and a U.S. and western public allergic to anything that even smacks of expanded involvement in the Middle East. But the people making the anti-Assad case in Washington are not exactly discouraged or demoralized. On July 20, while most of the country fixated on the chaos unfolding at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, I met with Chad Brand and Shlomo Bolts of the Washington, D.C.-based Syrian American Council (SAC), a group whose mission is to “organize and advocate for a free, democratic, and pluralistic Syria through American support.” SAC backs things like no-fly zones, the establishment of humanitarian safe-areas in Syria, and U.S. weapons and training assistance for the Syrian opposition. They’ve gotten a cold hearing from the White House, and have largely given up on lobbying Obama’s inner circle. At the same time, they push an attainable legislative agenda and have had some successes in Congress. House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Ed Royce, once a problematic member of Congress from the Syrian opposition’s perspective, is now a full-fledged ally; earlier this month he helped introduce a bill authored by Democrat Eliot Engel that would expand U.S. sanctions against the Assad regime. As Brand, one of SAC’s government relations officers, explained, Congress is “nipping at” Boeing’s controversial sale of aircraft to the Iran government, with some members of Congress insisting on measures that would ensure the planes aren’t used to ferry weapons and personnel to Syria. SAC has successfully advocated for including funding for the Syrian “train and equip” program in defense authorization bills. And they often get a sympathetic hearing from members of Congress and their staff when they recount the abuses of the Assad regime and the dangers the Syrian government poses to global order. Congressmen and their staff sometimes learn of specific regime atrocities for the first time from SAC: “To a person they say, ‘We didn’t know about that and we wish we knew.’ The problem is that the administration doesn’t brief us on these things, Brand said. He emphasized that SAC is a nonpartisan organization, “even if and when we get stymied by the administration.” Not even the potentially dubious choices of their own government, or the recent global wave of attacks by supporters of ISIS, whose “capital” is in the Syrian city of Raqqa; or the reality of ceaseless death and destruction in a strategically vital part of the world, have been enough to really make Americans care about Syria, even during a fractious election year. If anything, one of the two major U.S. political parties is tacking in a sharply isolationist direction, with Donald Trump alleging that Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton had supported regime change in Syria during his July 21 acceptance speech for the Republican presidential nomination. The fact that Americans have largely tuned out the moral and humanitarian dimensions of the conflict doesn’t mean SAC’s goals are hopeless. Bolts believes there a pragmatism to the American public and its leaders that won’t allow a situation like Syria’s to endure forever. “My own personal view is that something happens in the American political cycle when the public sees a lot of people dying repeatedly,” said Bolts. “There’s awareness for the first few massacres, and then after awhile people wonder, ‘What’s next?’ And if large numbers of people are killed, it deadens sensitivities. The main hope for us is to get people to understand the costs of their inactions….it’s not practical to ignore when tens of thousands of people are being killed.” “Long-term, long-game, there’s reason for optimism,” he added. “It could just be a much longer time frame than a lot of us were hoping for.” '
"So we need to be able to have some sense that Assad is on the way out. There can be a transition period, but it needs to be clear that he's not part of Syria's future. Until that happens, until there is at least the beginning, or the acknowledgment of that transition, you're going to have Syrians dying, continue to die, because they...many of them are trying to reclaim their country, for the good of Syria's future, but many of them also want Syria to be the safe haven for terrorists.
So I don't know whether or not Syria can be put back together again, whether there's going to be some kind of confederal structure, where the various confessional groups are going to have the lead in governing their portion of the country. We've looked at the different parts of the country, and which ones could be self-sustaining, which ones would rely so much on external assistance. Most of the people in Syria are in that western spine of the country, but large portions of the eastern part of Syria are desert and limited urban centres.
So, I don't think also you're going to be able to have some sense of tranquillity in Syria until you're also able to address the Iraq issue, and that's why I think this administration, and President Obama, gets a lot of credit at trying to look at what we need to do in both countries, so that what we're doing is going to be complementary to this effort."
1. Assad must go - At the most basic level, this can be treated as misdirection. The US has done everything to ensure Assad remains, getting ever closer to the Russians in their strategy of bombing anything that moves in rebel areas.
2. Many of them are trying to reclaim their country - And the administration wants to do as little as possible to help them do that. Again, it is only because there are other forces that want to support the rebels that the rhetoric changes to this from "We're not sure if there are forces in Syria we can work with."
4. Give the President some credit - Give it a rest. This is the President who said nothing should be done about Syria until ISIS took over half of Iraq, then that ISIS should be taken on in Iraq while Syria should have a train-and-equip programme that produced a literal handful of fighters, and even now thinks that sectarian militias backed up by sometimes ill-directed American bombing is the best way to deal with ISIS while the biggest dangers to life are accommodated.
Julian Röpcke:
"This is how WE are increasingly seen because of our ignorance of the situation in #Syria ...Silence is complicity."
'Syrian authorities backed by Russia on Thursday offered safe corridors out for residents and rebels in the city of Aleppo's besieged quarters.
Rebels and residents of Aleppo said they were skeptical of the safe-corridors offer, saying it presents them with an impossible choice between a slow death if they stay behind and possible detention if they attempt to leave. There was no sign of people massing to leave the besieged parts of the city.
"I will not leave. I will be the last man in the city," said Mohammed Zein Khandakani, 28, a resident of the Maadi neighborhood of Aleppo who volunteers with the city's medical council. "I can't imagine ever seeing a member of this regime one more time."
But Khandakani, formerly a lawyer who was detained for a month in the early days of the protests against the Syrian government, said he was worried about his family.
A father of two -- the youngest a girl of 9 months -- he said that despite the risk of maltreatment and even arrest, he is urging his mother, wife and sister to use the safe passages to leave the city. He said he hopes the Russian role and intense international attention to the humanitarian corridors proposition means the government would abstain from flagrant violations.
Few residents of eastern Aleppo said they expected good treatment if they accepted the government's offer.
"All the passages are going to the Assad regime," said Farida, a doctor in an Aleppo hospital who gave only her first name for safety reasons. Surrendering, she said, would mean, "death or jail," while the latter would eventually mean "death in the jail."
She acknowledged, however, that some civilians want to leave.
Aid groups have been warning of an impending siege, and with it a humanitarian crisis, after government forces cut the last road connecting Aleppo's eastern districts to rebel-held areas to the north.
Zaher Azzaher, an activist in Aleppo, said residents had begun to feel the pinch; one of his neighbors had acquired two barrels of fuel, and scores of people had lined up to get a share, he said.
"People are fighting over two bags of eggplants," he said. "I don't know how these eggplants managed to find their way here."
He said some residents hesitated to eat the food packs dropped from the air, out of fear that they might be poisoned.
Khandakani said life has progressively gotten harder under the 10-day old siege with bread and water shortages and electricity finally going out Wednesday.
"The next 48 hours are fateful for the whole revolution," he said via Whatsapp.
Youssef Rahal, a lawyer from Aleppo who left the city 10 days ago but remains in touch with people inside, said there is no way to get in vegetables or diesel fuel, which rebel-held areas used to buy from the market and transport through the now blockaded Castello Road.
This has affected bread production. "It means some people are getting only a quarter loaf of bread a day," he said.
Russia's defense minister said in televised comments that President Vladimir Putin has ordered a "large-scale humanitarian operation" that will begin outside Aleppo to help civilians as well as allow fighters who wanted to lay down their arms to surrender.
Shoigu said three corridors will be open for civilians and fighters who lay down their arms and a fourth corridor will provide fighters a "safe exit with weapons."
Bahaa Halabi, an opposition media activist inside Aleppo, said there are no corridors out of east Aleppo and even if there were, he would not take them.
"Definitely not. We will not surrender ourselves to the criminals. They are killing us every day. Slaughtering us, starving us, and besieging civilians," he said, speaking from the city via Skype.
Assad has issued amnesty offers several times during Syria's civil war, now in its sixth year. The latest offer, like those before it, is largely seen by opposition fighters as a publicity stunt and psychological warfare against the rebels. More than a quarter of a million people have died and millions have been displaced since March 2011, when Syria's conflict broke out.
Khandakani said the offensive and siege is depriving him of his "brief feelings of independence and freedom" living in the part of the city under rebel control since 2012.
"I am still waiting for a miracle. Something extraordinary, like the rebels for instance managing to open a corridor for us toward the liberated rural areas," he said.'
'Russia's "humanitarian corridor" in Syria. F**k the Putin,Obama,Assad,UN, and Arab world especially.' [https://twitter.com/Malcolmite/status/759072634319536128] '#Syria Rebels in eastern #Aleppo have enough weapons & ammo for years to resist against the siege by #Putin, #Assad & #Khamenei.' [https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/759033595524558848]
'Nusra Front leader Abu Mohamed al-Golani confirmed late on Thursday that his group has formally split from al-Qaeda and has renamed itself the Levantine Conquest Front. "The creation of this new front aims to close the gap between the jihadi factions in the Levant," Golani said in his first televised appearance, soon after Nusra released the first photo of the leader ever seen publicly. "By breaking our link, we aim to protect the Syrian revolution."
The split appears to be an attempt by Nusra to attract other opposition groups to unify with it, just as the US and Russia have reportedly agreed to target Nusra and the Islamic State (IS) militant group.
Earlier this week, a writer purporting to be a Dutch associate of Nusra called Al-Maqalaat andsaid that the timing of the decision was "no coincidence".
"The overall message of the break with al-Qaeda will be that the US is not enemies with al-Qaeda or any other so-called terrorist organisation, but their animosity is against the Muslim Ummah as a whole, especially the Muslims who are seeking to establish the rule of Islam," Al-Maqalaat wrote.
"If the other parties agree to any of these preconditions, then this would be the best deal in the history of Islam, or rather mankind. If the other parties agree to these preconditions, then the breaking of ties between Jabhat Nusra and al-Qaeda will form a major backlash for the West."
At the daily State Department news conference on Thursday, spokesman John Kirby said the US has "certainly seen no indication that would give us reason to change the designation of this group".
"My interpretation is that Nusra was not doing it to avoid being bombed, because it will be bombed either way," said Thomas Pierret, a lecturer in contemporary Islam at the University of Edinburgh.
Instead, the group is "playing chess" with other rebel groups, like Ahrar al-Sham, who have long demanded that Nusra break its allegiance to al-Qaeda in order for the groups to unify. When joint Russian-US operations start, Pierret said, Nusra will be able to say it has fulfilled its end of the bargain.
"I think there will be limited appetite among more mainline or nationalist rebel brigades to join up with the Nusra that has been picking them off one by one and progressively seizing political control in the north," Sam Heller, a Beirut-based analyst who tweets as Abu Jamajem, said.
Both analysts said it is unlikely that Ahrar al-Sham, the other main fighting force in northern Syria, would join the new Nusra venture.
Since its inception, they said, Ahrar has tried to avoid being designated as a terrorist group by the US, and has been successful. If Ahrar joined the new incarnation of Nusra, it would risk being blacklisted, especially as the US will likely continue to designate Nusra a terrorist organisation regardless of the split.
"My gut feeling is that an integration between Ahrar and a non-al-Qaeda Nusra wouldn't mainstream and legitimise Nusra; to the contrary, it would just render Ahrar politically toxic," Heller said.
Still, Pierret said, Ahrar's leadership is divided. One faction within the leadership has pushed for a "moderate line" that has included involvement in peace negotiations and abiding by ceasefires, with little pay-off for the group.
"So inevitably, if the line you are pushing appears to be a complete failure in the end, the countervailing line gets more weight and credit within the organisation. So I wouldn’t be surprised if the hardliners were on the rise again," Pierret said. If this faction were to join the new Nusra, he added, it would be such a strong force that it would be difficult for the rest of the organisation not to join.
Equally, he said, other rebel groups may be eyeing the Nusra split and wondering whether this is a last-ditch opportunity, especially since the result of "playing nice" over the winter - abiding by ceasefires and participating in negotiations - is Aleppo besieged and the rebels "got exterminated," he said.
"So what is the point of being a moderate rebel today in Syria?" he said, referring to the US-backed New Syrian Army push last month in eastern Syria, which resulted in the group being routed by IS.
"The only credible option is to be cannon fodder for silly [US-led] anti-IS operations in the desert." '
A Human Rights Watch report out Thursday documents how Russian aircraft dropped cluster bombs on an informal fuel market outside Termanin, a village in Idlib province, on July 11, killing 10 and wounding more than 30 people. The victims were all civilians and included two who were first responders.
According to HRW, three fighter aircraft, two of them SU-34s flown only by Russia, and an SU-24 that’s in both the Russian and Syrian air force, launched eight attacks: the first two of them using cluster bombs—large canisters containing dozens of tiny bomblets that scatter through the air and across the ground. Many do not explode—at first, but may kill and maim days, months, even years later.
The Daily Beast asked the State Department how the U.S. expects to bring Russia into compliance with the 1949 Geneva Conventions’ ban on indiscriminate attacks if it doesn’t publish or otherwise inform the public of its intelligence findings. There was no response.
One reason for U.S. silence about Russian violations is that the Obama administration has classified its intelligence findings in order to “protect sources and methods” of collection. Making that information public “would also set a precedent of the U.S. reporting on foreign military activity,” a senior administration official told us earlier this year. “Where do you draw the line?”
But that leaves open the question of whether the U.S. government has raised the issue with Russia and how Russia responded. It also raises the larger question of whether international law as drafted after World War II will be respected when a major power violates the laws of armed conflict with impunity and there’s no public protest from the United States.
Ever since Russia began its bombing campaign Sept. 30, the U.S. response has been largely “hands-off.” Despite public pleas by Syria’s moderate opposition and private urging by neighboring states like Turkey, the U.S. has not stepped up aid to moderate rebel forces already receiving U.S. military support, nor has it threatened the use of force or any other measures that would raise the price for Russian intervention. Instead, the administration has sought a cease-fire through what it calls diplomatic means, which it hopes will lead to a negotiated settlement of the Syrian conflict.
But the Russian and Syrian governments in the past month instead have gone for the kill in Aleppo, Syria’s biggest city, and now the timetable for negotiations appears to be put off until the end of August. Syrian forces, augmented by Iranian ground troops and the Lebanese Hezbollah milita and Russian air power, cut the last road to the rebel held enclave July 10. Besides surrounding the eastern part of Aleppo, which has a population of at least 300,000, the regime-led forces destroyed four of the eight hospitals and the only blood bank and forensic lab. They also dropped barrel bombs and other munitions on residential areas.
But the Obama administration has yet to draw attention to the biggest siege since Serb forces surrounded Sarajevo from 1992 to 1995.
Throughout the Russian intervention in Syria, the administration has refused to clarify whether Russia or Syria is responsible for the destruction of hospitals, schools, mosques, and infrastructure protected by international law.
In early May, after airstrikes destroyed a camp for displaced persons in northern Idlib province, Russia rejected charges that its aircraft were responsible. After Russia and the Syrian regime were accused of bombing several major hospitals in rebel-held Aleppo, a hospital in regime-held Aleppo came under attack also in early May. The government blamed rebel forces, but those forces said they didn’t have weapons that could have reached the target and said the government had launched the attack in order to claim that the rebels were a criminal force.
Given that the U.S. intelligence gathering capabilities in the region are extensive, especially where warplanes are concerned, Washington almost certainly knows who is doing what from the air. But there are none so blind as those who will not see, and the official refusal to acknowledge culpability undermines the efforts of those organizations and journalists who are trying to get at the truth.
Increasingly, it appears that the administration has written off Aleppo and with it the popular rebellion against Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad. Whatever criticism the U.S. may have stated when Russia began its armed intervention, officials now rationalized it as Moscow’s rescue of a longtime ally.
In March, a senior U.S. official said that Russia had intervened because rebel forces were advancing so fast that they threatened the survival of the Assad regime. There was great concern in Russia “about potential catastrophic success” under which “Assad collapses, but so do all the Syrian state institutions.”
The Russian intervention has returned Syria “to the stalemate,” the official said.
On Wednesday, the State Department cast the Russian intervention in the context of Moscow’s long-term alliance with Damascus. Russia has “a historic defense relationship with Syria that goes well back before the current conflict,” department spokesman John Kirby told reporters. “They’ve had basing there. They’ve had troops there. They’ve had a presence there. So it came as a shock to no one in the State Department that as the civil war progressed in Syria, that they would have interest in how things were going,” he said.
The question of the moment, however, is why Washington seems to have no interest in the war crimes Russia commits as part of that “interest in how things were going.” '
'When a place has been besieged for years and hunger stalks the streets, you might have thought people would have little interest in books. But enthusiasts have stocked an underground library in Syria with volumes rescued from bombed buildings - and users dodge shells and bullets to reach it. Buried beneath a bomb-damaged building, it's home to a secret library that provides learning, hope and inspiration to many in the besieged Damascus suburb of Darayya.
"We saw that it was vital to create a new library so that we could continue our education. We put it in the basement to help stop it being destroyed by shells and bombs like so many other buildings here," says Anas Ahmad, a former civil engineering student who was one of the founders.
"In many cases we get books from bomb or shell-damaged homes. The majority of these places are near the front line, so collecting them is very dangerous," he says. "We have to go through bombed-out buildings to hide ourselves from snipers. We have to be extremely careful because snipers sometimes follow us in their sights, anticipating the next step we'll take."
Since a temporary truce broke down in May, shells and barrel bombs have fallen almost every day. The location of the library is secret because Anas and other users fear it would be targeted by Darayya's attackers if they knew where it was.
It turns out that even the greatly out-gunned Free Syrian Army fighters, who have the daunting task of defending the town, are avid readers.
"Truly I swear the library holds a special place in all our hearts. And every time there's shelling near the library we pray for it," says Omar Abu Anas, a former engineering student now helping to defend his home town.
Unfortunately for Omar, his fellow fighters and the people of Darayya, they may soon have little time for reading. Over the past two weeks Syrian government forces and their Hezbollah allies have moved into all the farmland around the suburb and even some outlying residential areas. For now though, Omar says the library is helping to strengthen the town's defences as well as its resolve.
"Books motivate us to keep on going. We read how in the past everyone turned their backs on a particular nation, yet they still made it. So we can be like that too. They help us plan for life once Assad is gone. We can only do that through the books we are reading. We want to be a free nation. And hopefully, by reading, we can achieve this." '
'I am Ghalia Rahal, the mother of the martyr, Khaled al-Issa. Khaled was among the first revolutionaries to take part in the peaceful demonstrations in Kafr Nabel from the very beginning in Syria. Until the very last, he never deviated from the revolution because he believed strongly in its ideals and in his country. He defended the people who were being killed by the Syrian regime and Russian aerial bombardments and the injustice and oppression of the regime in Syria. Khaled believed deeply in Syrians’ aspirations and he would tell me: “My Mother, from the very first day that I began taking part in the protests, I considered myself as ready to die for the revolution. I’m going to work for the people – because I’m sure that after all the sacrifices we have made, there will be results. And even if we cannot see the results ourselves, the children who follow us will be able to see the results one day. ” Khaled used to go to Aleppo a lot to document the crimes going on there. The last time I talked with him he told me there were so many people in Aleppo who were being targeted and bombed and yet there were not many journalists in Aleppo. That’s why he wanted to go there – to document the crimes that were actually taking place. By taking photos with his camera, he could photograph cases of massive violations of human rights taking place in Aleppo. The last thing he told me was thousands of journalists and photographers were needed to cover the crimes that were occurring in Aleppo. He used to tell me: My Mother, you should continue working with women so that they can learn resistance during the war and prepare the following generations with an education, where criminality, murders and destruction no longer exist and so that peace reigns. He used to say: My Mother, if I am there or not, you must continue your work and I will continue mine too. That is why I will continue my work. Khaled’s spirit is with me constantly and I will continue even if there is no physical presence, because his spirit will always be with me. Firstly, as a Syrian citizen and secondly, as the mother of the martyr Khaled al-Issa and as one of those who participated in the Syrian revolution from its earliest days, and with the help of God, we will continue until our very last breath.
Even if we have lost those who are dearest to us, we will be stronger and will continue for our children. We will carry on for the following generations; for freedom and dignity and even though, as I told you, the price is dear. Yet despite this price we will carry on. We say no to tyrants, no to the unfaithful, no to destruction, no to assassinations. We live for peace alone. Our sacrifices will be for peace and nothing else.'
'Nasser lifts another cigarette to his mouth with a scarred left hand, chain smoking and watching action films on a grainy TV at his friend's flat in a Beirut suburb. Since deserting President Bashar al-Assad's army he mostly avoids venturing outdoors. He limits his movements to a few hundred yards from this temporary accommodation, fearing arrest for squatting in Lebanon illegally. Nasser used an alias for fear of identification by Lebanese or Syrian authorities. Many young Syrian men are deserting like Nasser or dodging the draft altogether to avoid the experiences that have left conscripts physically and mentally scarred and with an uncertain future. The prospect of being forced to fight in a civil war is a major factor driving them in large numbers to seek refuge in neighboring countries or Europe. After his injuries and nearly three years of service, Nasser deserted and hid at home in Damascus for one year. He turned himself in when Assad announced an amnesty for deserters, but said he was immediately sent for 15 days of interrogation. Instead of returning to his unit, Nasser fled to Lebanon, crossing illegally for fear of being turned back, and has moved from one location to another for months, struggling to find work and failing to obtain refugee status. "I'm young but tired of life. Every time I see a military vehicle I'm scared, it's constant stress."
"There are guys who haven't seen their families for years while they've been in the army. Sometimes the families don't know if they're still alive," said Jawad, whose brother fled to Germany to avoid enlistment. "I don't want to kill anyone. It's an injustice that someone who doesn't want to fight is forced to," Jawad added. He wants to see his family in coastal Latakia, but will not return while the war rages for fear of being drafted.
Kheder Khaddour of the Carnegie Middle East Center said the number serving in the army is likely to have shrunk considerably through defections, deaths, desertion and draft-dodging. "If it was 300,000 in the army, now it's less than half and probably less than that, that seems like a large number," Khaddour said.'
