FSA Commander: I swear we will not be defeated in Daraa

 'Our people in Daraa and all of Syria: Hundreds of warplanes and helicopters are striking our cities. Hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed in this battle. Most of them are women, children, and the elderly. We tell you that we don't suffer from cowardice or greed, but we suffer from abandonment.

 Why does the régime want to take over Daraa city? Why does it want to break Daraa city? Daraa city must fall because it represents the symbol of the revolution. Why is there this determination to defeat the city? Did you ask yourself that? Simply, because the city is the heart of Daraa, and if it falls to the régime, all of Horan may be divided. And the remaining areas will fall one by one, village after village, and town after town. In the east and the west.

 The régime was just 200 metres from the gates of the old border crossing. It was preparing the final blow, and betting on our division and disagreements. But the free people of Daraa and Horan managed to ignore their disagreements. The revolutionary spirit came back, and they formed the Bunyan al-Marsous operations room. They took the régime by surprise. Under our blows, régime forces retreated thousands of metres in three months. In a hundred days, for each metre, we lost one man, woman and child. We paid a bloody price, and filled the streets with the dead bodies of Iranian and Hezbollah terrorists.

 I swear, we repelled them while warplanes were bombing us, missiles hitting us, and helicopters filled the sky. We have nothing to confront these warplanes, since everyone decided that they wouldn't give us anything to confront these warplanes.

 We have men capable of smashing Hezbollah élite fighters, and defeating Iran's sectarian militias, but we blame those who let these militias infiltrate us easily. We blame those whose ineffectiveness made birds nest in the barrels of their tanks, which are the tanks of the revolution and the revolutionaries. We blame those whose arms depots will soon be looted by Hezbollah if Daraa falls to the régime, God forbid! We blame those who are waiting for us to become weak and lose our strength, so they can achieve their goals.

 We complain about lying, deception and false excuses. We complain about those who think Astana is a gain, and sit there to represent countries supporting them. We know that Assad, guided by Russia, is procrastinating and manoeuvring. What is worse, the sponsoring states are the ones who are killing us. What blindness! What silliness! How can we accept guarantees from countries whose warplanes are killing us?

 If they had been honest, and told us to sign a surrender agreement in Astana, we would have had respect for those who have gone, and maybe we would have gone with them. Or we would have told them, as we do now, "Death over humiliation!" But they say, "Come to Astana, so we can fool and distract you, then we can eliminate you one by one."

 Isn't it time now to understand this game? It's time now to understand how they dealt with us one by one, so they can easily break and defeat us. But we will not be defeated in Daraa, I swear, we will not be defeated. We still have faith in God. And we still rely on an uprising of factions against their leaders, and an uprising of leaders against foreign states.

 To our brothers we say, every day our men kill dozens of Iranian forces and Hezbollah fighters. We kill them and see with our eyes their yellow flags, hoping not to see them fluttering on your hills.

 Peace, mercy, and blessings of God be upon you.