News of the death of prominent anti-Assad commander (or ‘terrorist,’ ‘rebel,’ ‘opposition commander,’ etc.) Zahran Alloush has the potential to radically alter the nature of the war in Syria.
Considering Alloush and other senior members of the leadership of
the Salafist militant group Jaish al-Islam were killed in a major
airstrike carried out by the Syrian air force, there is undoubtedly
going to be a transformation on the ground as initiative on the
battlefield, particularly in Southern Syria, shifts still further to the
Syrian Arab Army and its allies.
With Alloush out of the picture and, based on reports coming from
sources inside the opposition, significant disarray at the uppermost
echelons of leadership of the barely cohesive “Islamic Army,” it seems
clear that the Syrian government is likely to move in to reestablish
control of Douma, Ghouta, and other rebel-held suburbs of Damascus.
However, while many international observers lament the loss of this
“iron-fisted leader” less than a month ahead of planned peace talks set
to take place in late January 2016, nearly all analyses of this
development have failed (deliberately omitted?) to elucidate just what
the rebel groups under his command were doing in Ghouta and Douma, the
nature of the ongoing war within the war between the Syrian military and
the factions in control of these key suburbs, and the propaganda about
the key strategic corridor and the events that have taken place there,
including the infamous “Douma market attack” of August 2015 (which I
debunked
here).
By examining the wealth of information about Alloush, his ideology,
his organization, and their activities in the rebel stronghold suburbs
of Damascus, it becomes clear that the airstrike that ultimately killed
him and many of his Salafist comrades did far more than simply kill a
leader of an important rebel group. Rather, this was a monumental, and
perhaps mortal, blow to an entire segment of the rebel-terrorist
coalition fighting against the Syrian government and people.
Zahran Alloush: Reality vs Perception
In the days since Alloush’s death there have been, rather
predictably, numerous articles written about the assassination, nearly
all of which portray Alloush as something of a ‘moderate,’ a man who by
the sheer force of his personality and will led an armed faction which
stood as “defenders of the true revolution” in their steadfast
opposition to both Assad and the Islamic State. One could be forgiven
for thinking that Alloush was a patriot doing his part to defend Syria
from the Islamic State and the brutal dictator
TM rather than a vicious Salafist who committed countless war crimes against the Syrian people, among others.
Take for instance the
New York Times, writing just hours after the assassination was announced:
Mr. Alloush led the Army of Islam, a group that had
recently agreed to participate in a political process seeking to end the
five-year-old conflict…Analysts said the strikes were in keeping
with longstanding efforts by the Syrian government and its allies to
eliminate groups claiming to occupy a middle ground between Mr. Assad
and the Islamic State. The efforts are part of a broader objective to
improve Mr. Assad’s standing among Western governments, which despise
him but also see the Islamic State as an increasing menace.
Consider the implication of the phrase “groups claiming to occupy a
middle ground between Mr. Assad and the Islamic State.” While this is
classic corporate media faux-objectivity, the reality is that this is
cleverly constructed misinformation designed to validate and legitimize
an absolutely discredited notion, namely that there is a significant
difference between the ideology of Alloush’s organization and that of
the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL). Indeed, the NYT here is unsurprisingly
bolstering official Washington’s line that the US must support “moderate
opposition” which, in the subtext of that phrase, is everyone who is
not ISIS/ISIL. But real experts on Syria recognize that this is merely
political window-dressing, that in fact the difference between Jaish
al-Islam, Ahrar al-Sham, Jabhat al-Nusra (Al-Qaeda’s official Syrian
affiliate), and the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) is just words; these
organizations compete for influence and control, but do not truly differ
ideologically.
Joshua Landis, Director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the
University of Oklahoma and widely regarded as one of the world’s
foremost experts on Syria, suffers no such delusions about Alloush. In
December 2013, Landis
wrote:
Zahran Alloush’s rhetoric and propaganda videos provide
much insight into his world view, attitude toward Syria’s religious
minorities, and vision for Syria’s future. The difference between his
ideology and that of al-Qaida groups is not profound. Rather, it is one
of shades of grey. [The video linked
in the article] is an anti-Shiite tirade and
“bring-back-the-Umayyad-Empire” propaganda piece. It shows how sectarian
Alloush is. He refers to Shiites, and reduces the Nusayris into this
grouping, as “Majous”, or crypto-Iranians… Here it is an Islamic term
of abuse meant to suggest that Alawites and Iranians not only have the
wrong religion but also the wrong ethnicity—they are not Arabs, but
crypto-Iranians…[This] demonstrates how demonized the Alawites are in
the propaganda of the new Islamic Front. Zahran calls for
cleansing Damascus of all Shiites and Nusayris… On hearing this sort of
talk from the leaders of the revolution, Alawites and other non-Sunni
sects worry that their struggle is a fight for their very existence [emphasis added].
This video and the language of Alloush demonstrates [sic] how
difficult it is to draw a clear line between the ideology of the Islamic
Front and that of the al-Qaida groups [emphasis added]. They both
embrace foreign jihadists and encourage them to come Syria to join the
fight. They both call for the resurrection of an Islamic Empire and they
both look back to the Golden Age of Islam for the principles upon which
the new state will be founded. Their political philosophy and blue
print for the future is largely based on a similar reading of Islamic
history and the Qur’an.
Some analysts try to draw a clear line between al-Qaida and the
Islamic Front, insisting that the former support changing Syria’s
borders and seek to establish a Caliphate while the latter are Syrian
Nationalists. Unfortunately, this distinction is not evident in their
rhetoric. Both idealize Islamic Empire, both reject democracy and
embrace what they call shari’a, both welcome jihadists from the “Islamic
Umma,” both fly the black flag of Islam rather than the Syrian flag as
their predominant emblem. The Islamic Front is dominated by Syrians who
do have clear parochial interests, whereas ISIS is run by an Iraqi.
Foreigners play a dominate role in its command, but this is not so with
the Islamic Front. All the same, their ideologies overlap in significant
ways.
Landis, well known as a fierce critic of Bashar al-Assad and the
Syrian Government, here removes the mask from Alloush and quickly
debunks and thoroughly discredits any attempts to manufacture moderation
in the figure of Alloush. Far from being one of the mythical
“moderates” that Obama & Co. are always prattling on about, Alloush
is unmistakably a jihadist of the first order, one whose ideology, as
Landis correctly noted, is not at all different from that of Al Qaeda
and ISIS/ISIL. Indeed, this is only further confirmed in this
video where, as Landis points out, Alloush:
“goes to some lengths to explain that his relationship
with Nusra [al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria] is one of brotherhood with
only superficial ideological differences that can be settled with
shari’a and discussions. This supports my argument that the ideological
differences between the Front and al-Qaida are not deep.”
Of course, rhetorical flourishes aside, the question of actual crimes
committed by Alloush and his jihadi comrades is critical to examine.
In late 2014 and early 2015, Alloush commanded
Jaish al-Islam to fire rockets indiscriminately onto Damascus,
a blatant war crime. Many Syrians were killed in these attacks. It
is important to note that while the pro-rebel media outlets would make
an equivalence between such attacks and the infamous “barrel bombs” of
the Syrian Arab Army, the reality is that these are simply not
comparable. The aerial offensives carried out by Syria’s air force have
targeted rebel strongholds with clear military and strategic targets,
while the Jaish al-Islam rocket attacks were fired at civilians without
any specific targeting. This is not to say one has to sanction the
SAA’s tactics, just to understand the difference between them and those
used by the rebels.
Whether one wants to use this to absolve Assad and the Government of
blame or not, the inescapable fact is that bombardment by the military
was never indiscriminate. By contrast, the purpose of Alloush’s
bombardment of Damascus was solely to inflict terror on the population
of Syria’s capital, and to take revenge for attacks carried out by the
Syrian armed forces.
Charles Lister, a vehemently anti-Assad analyst with the Brookings Doha Center, noted in a
tweet that
referenced an announcement by Alloush via twitter, that “Jaish al-Islam
has begun a massive mortar & Grad rocket attack on central
#Damascus,
to ‘cleanse the capital.’” Indeed, the use of the word “cleanse” is
instructive as it illustrates the attitude and ideology of Alloush as it
is practiced on the battlefield. His desire to ethnically cleanse
Syria was never mere rhetoric. Any way you slice it, Alloush and Jaish
al-Islam committed this act that constitutes a war crime.
Interestingly, Alloush’s ideological and rhetorical brotherhood with
the Nusra Front translated into on-the-ground collaboration,
particularly at the infamous massacre in the Damascus suburb of Adra.
While pseudo-alternative media propagandists such as James Miller at The
Intercept callously
claimed that
no massacre occurred at Adra, instead claiming that RT and other
non-Western media that reported it were simply spreading disinformation,
Miller and his ilk’s attempts to cover up what truly happened fell
flat.
Award-winning journalist Patrick Cockburn, writing in the UK
Independent on February 9, 2014, painted a chilling portrait of the
horrors of the Mhala family and others in Adra. Cockburn
wrote:
Accounts of what happened to the rest of the population
of Adra are confused. I spoke to some of the 5,000 refugees who had been
allowed to leave by Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic Front on 30
December and some of whom are now squatting in a giant cement factory.
They said the jihadis had ordered them to their basements and had kept
them there. The number singled out for execution is put at between 32
and 80. There are accounts of the doctor in the local clinic, a
Christian known locally as Dr George, being decapitated. Bakery workers
who resisted their machinery being taken away were roasted in their own
oven. Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic Front fighters went from house to
house with a list of names and none of those taken away then has been
[sic] since. This includes the head of the legal department at the
Information Ministry who disappeared with his wife and daughter and
whose phone is now being answered by a man saying he belongs to Jabat
al-Nusra.
It is critical to note the close collaboration here between Nusra and
the Islamic Front, the coalition in which Alloush’s Jaish al-Islam is a
founding member and plays a central role. A resident of Adra, the
wife of a doctor in town,
explained that,
“The armed men were non-Syrians. We lived terrible days,
before we could escape with only the clothes that we wore…We woke up at
dawn with the sound of bullets… we saw men carrying black flags of Jaish
al-Islam and Jabhat al-Nusra. Some of them were singing ‘Alawites we
have come to cut off your heads’ song, and this was the song they first
sang at the start of the war in Idlib.”
Such egregious war crimes and crimes against humanity are par for the
course for Jaish al-Islam. In early November 2015, just weeks before
Alloush was finally killed, Jaish al-Islam made international headlines
after
parading caged civilians through
the streets of Ghouta, with cages of women being placed atop the
organization’s headquarters and other key buildings to act as human
shields against possible Syrian or Russian airstrikes.
According to the corporate media’s own darling, the
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (the
one-man anti-Assad operation run by Rami Abdel Rahman which has become
the primary source for much of the western media’s reporting on Syria),
Jaish al-Islam “spread cages over several areas and squares in the
Eastern Ghouta putting inside them regime forces’ officers, soldiers and
their families.” Despite the attempt by SOHR to soft-peddle the war
crime by characterizing the victims as “regime forces and their
families,” the obvious barbarity of such an act is not lost on any
genuine political observer. Such actions certainly go a long way toward
debunking the spurious assertion that Alloush and Jaish al-Islam (or
Alloush’s original group Liwa al-Islam) are anything that could be
described as “moderate.”
Their terrorist credentials are further bolstered by the dastardly
role they played in the chemical weapons attack, and subsequent attempts
to derail the dismantling of the chemical weapons stockpile by the
Syrian Government. Even if one were to dispute the very provocative
alleged video evidence (
here,
here, and
here with excellent, balanced analysis
here)
of Alloush’s Liwa al-Islam (his organization before consolidation as
Jaish al-Islam) there are clear and unmistakable connections between
Alloush and the entire chemical weapons saga in Syria.
According to
military and strategic analyst, and retired Brigadier General, Ali
Maqsoud, the Liwa al-Islam forces arrayed in Jobar included “the
so-called ‘Chemical Weapons Front’ led by Zahran Alloush [the supreme
leader of Liwaa al-Islam]. That group possesses primitive chemical
weapons smuggled from al-Qaida in Iraq to Jobar, in the vicinity of
Damascus…[they used]rockets [which] were manufactured domestically to
carry chemicals. They were launched from an area controlled by Liwaa
al-Islam.”
Maqsoud’s analysis was substantiated by a comprehensive report
released in January 2014 (more than four months after the incident), by
former UN weapons inspector Richard Lloyd and Prof. Theodore Postol of
MIT which effectively debunked the claims of the US government (along
with Human Rights Watch and a number of other organizations) that the
Syrian military carried out the attack. The Lloyd/Postol report showed
definitively that US intelligence and conclusions regarding the incident
were grossly inaccurate. The
report,
entitled Possible Implications of Faulty US Technical Intelligence in
the Damascus Nerve Agent Attack of August 21, 2013, notes that:
The Syrian improvised chemical munitions that were used
in the August 21 nerve agent attack in Damascus have a range of about
2km…[The evidence] indicates that these munitions could not possibly
have been fired at East Ghouta from the ‘heart’, or from the eastern
edge, of the Syrian Government-controlled area shown in the intelligence
map published by the White House on August 30, 2013…The UN independent
assessment of the range of the chemical munitions is in exact agreement
with our finding.
In other words, Lloyd and Postol confirmed with their findings that
the chemical attack of August 21, 2013, which almost led to a direct US
military intervention, was carried out from area controlled by Alloush
and Liwa al-Islam. This is further substantiated in Pulitzer Prize
winner Seymour Hersh’s infamous April 2014 exposé
The Red Line and the Rat Line which noted that:
The American and British intelligence communities had
been aware since the spring of 2013 that some rebel units in Syria were
developing chemical weapons… Defense Intelligence Agency issued a highly
classified five-page ‘talking points’ briefing…[which] drew on
classified intelligence from numerous agencies: ‘Turkey and Saudi-based
chemical facilitators,’ it said, ‘were attempting to obtain sarin
precursors in bulk, tens of kilograms, likely for the anticipated
large-scale production effort in Syria.’
Naturally, this must be seen in connection with the now well
established fact that Alloush is essentially an agent of Saudi Arabia.
Without funding and support from Riyadh, Alloush’s organization would
never have even gotten off the ground at the outbreak of the war in
Syria in early 2011. Christof Lehmann of nsnbc
wrote in October 2013 that:
Several commanders of al-Qaeda brigades in Syria have
stated that Zahran Alloush receives his orders directly from Saudi
Intelligence. Russian diplomatic sources stated… that people of many
different political observances have provided information to Russian
diplomats. Statements to the effect that Zahran Alloush receives his
orders directly from the Saudi Intelligence are corroborated by the fact
that both Alloush and the Liwa-al-Islam are financed by the Saudi
Interior Ministry. The group was literally established with Saudi money
after Alloush was released from prison in 2011 [just weeks before the
first unrest in Syria began]. According to international law, this fact
alone is sufficient to designate Alloush and the Liwa-al-Islam as Saudi
mercenaries.
There was an obvious direct line between Riyadh and Ghouta with
Alloush and his organization. That line has now been permanently
severed with his death and those of other key figures of the
organization. This will have major implications for the future of the
war in Syria, especially with the beginning of a peace process coming at
the end of January 2016, less than four weeks from the time of
publication.
Part Two of this article will focus on the implications of Alloush’s
elimination for the future of this war. How will this major setback for
the rebel/terrorist factions impact any negotiations? How will it
affect the military situation on the ground? The article will also
attempt to place into a broader narrative the “war within the war”
between the Syrian military and the Alloush-led rebel groups in the
Damascus suburbs.
For now, one thing is certain: this assassination marks a major turning point in this bloody, nearly five year old war.
