Russia and Turkey will pacify Idlib Province

 As of today (7 October) the situation in Syria is looking bad for the jihadis of HTS (AQ) and the IS out in the east.  The IS pocket east of Salamiya is all but gone and the R+6 has cleared the Deir al- Zor/Sukhna/Palmyra LOC of the predictable IS attempt to turn the R+6 out of Deir al-Zor by interrupting their logistics flow.  Just to make things really horrible for the takfiris the SAA has reached Mayadiin on the Euphrates.  Thus far the SAA have taken the airport and are fighting in the town.

The other main obstacle to government re-conquest of the country is Idlib Province.  It is now largely under control of HTS (AQ) but a de-escalation agreement among Russia, Iran Turkey and Syria has been concluded with regard to the province.  HTS is excluded from the agreement and will be fair game when the agreement is executed.

Now we have the interesting spectacle of Turkish troops massing on the Hatay Province/ Syria border with some evidence of fighting at the border having begun as HTS seeks to resist Turkish entry into Syria. 

Evidently the plan is for the Turks to break HTS power and for Russia to occupy most of the province in support of non-jihadi forces.  The Turkish side may intend to crush the Kurdish pocket around Afrin in the process thus eliminating one of Sultan Tayyip's bugaboos.

This pacification of Idlib would leave a few isolated pockets of insurgent control around the country but the Russian sponsored de-escalation negotiations seem likely to eliminate them  Assad's "policy of leniency"makes that process possible.

IMO there is probably an understanding between Putin and Trump with regard to Syria.  This understanding has probably not been communicated very far down the chain of command.  Trump is a business hustler.  He would feel very little need to communicate his private understandings to people he thinks of as his employees.  Such an understanding would stand outside the Israeli's understanding of DJT himself.  IMO "J" is correct when he writes that the Israelis see Trump as their "prize bull." 

They must be frustrated with the level of his inaction on behalf of their project for Syria.  This is sharply in contrast to his acceptance of their "program" for Iran.  pl 

https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/turkish-army-jihadist-rebels-clash-idlib/

https://southfront.org/erdogan-confirms-upcoming-turkish-military-intervention-in-syrias-idlib-governorate/

Comments

[mike]

The Turks and Turkish proxies will turn a part of Idlib into another den of rape and murder like they did in al-Shabba. That district of Aleppo province, Azaz, Jarabulus, and al-Bab, which was occupied by the Turkish Army since August 2016 has been turned into areas of prostitution, hashish cultivation, and the people are afraid of abduction and murder.

"Free Police, mercenaries of the Sultan Murad are continuing their practices against the people and the displaced until they have reached the rape of women by the force of arms and harassing them. A number of pictures were leaked of the Sultan Murad commander Suleiman Shah in his car(van) with a woman, and sources told our agency that the car is only dedicated to prostitution acts of Suleiman Shah mercenaries.

Mustafa al-Fadhil, one of the leaders of the police station in the town of Akhtarin, repeatedly harassed a displaced woman from the city of Raqqa, called (N,A), at gunpoint. The sister and her husband tried to file a complaint to lead the outpost, but were threatened by the elements of the outpost that they will be killed if they talk about the subject.

The residents of the town reported that these cases were frequent in the town’s police station with women prisoners, poor women and displaced women, and with the mercenaries’ wives whose husbands were killed in battles.

The sources have confirmed that there are 3 cases of rape or sexual harassment every 24 hours, most of them with displaced women in the camps of Jarablus and Azaz, and each woman is given 120 Turkish pounds under pressure to harass them."

[Babak Makkinejad]

His program for Iran is that of the Mukhtar of Sunni Arabs against the Party of Ali; a program and posture that has wounded and will continue to wound USA, the avowed secular republic, in years and decades to come.

[FB Ali]

It is disappointing to read such unsourced trash on SST.

It is obviously blatant propaganda. I hold no brief for Turkey or its camp-followers, but these kinds of allegations smell of an agenda, besides being phrased so crudely.

[The Twisted Genius]

Not only are the SAA Tiger Force battling in Mayadiin, but the jihadis have declared they have abandoned the city as their capital. They moved south to al Bukamal. Looks like IS shot their wad in their last big offensive to cut the Deir al- Zor/Sukhna/Palmyra LOC. I wonder what CENTCOM has to say about the assault on Al-Qaryatayn by 300 or so Is jihadis last week. The Russians are saying the Al Tanf area has become a "black hole" where refugees are being used as a shield to cover the jihadis.

http://tass.com/defense/969330

[Annem]

The other side of the Turkish occupation of part of northern Syria is their administration via local Islamist NGO and appointed officials in cooperation with Turkish counterparts from various NGOs and ministries. In the field of education, for example, they are rebuilding the system along the lines of the controversial Turkish "imam-hatip" religious public schools that have replaced a very significant % of public middle and high schools and into which many students are forced to go under various excuses. So, like Turkey, Erdogan has set his sights on creating a "pious generation" of young Syrians. Where this leaves those citizens in the region who are not fans of Islamism or are not Sunni Muslims is anyone's guess. It may mean that like Idlib, it will end up a "minority-free zone."

[different clue]

Can the Erdogan goverment really be trusted to help pacify Idlib in such a way that the entire province is returned to Syrian sovereign control? Assuming it can't, does the Russian government have the power to apply immediate torture to the Turkish economy and apply it so deeply and so comprehensively as to torture Erdogan himself to submit to the actual re-Syrianization of the entirety of Idlib Province?

[Grazhdanochka]

Not only that FB Ali but even if you take this Statement as True, Idlib Province is hardly Paradigm of peaceful civility as things are currently so it would not be so much 'turn in to' as much as simply changing of the Guard. (To one ultimately more under the Thrall of TSK)

[Grazhdanochka]

It is worth noting that Afrin SDF has been notably 'closer' with Syria/Russia than those across Euphrates and whom operate more consistently with US and Coalition Advisers.

This ultimately begs a Question, should the 'Euphrates Shield' backed lightly by TKS advance successfully in to Idlib and look to be turning Gaze on SDF in around Afrin, does this present an eventual fait accompli to SDF in the Area? Ultimately forcing them to Moscow and Syrian Government as its Diplomatic Umbrella (and thus not only preventing ES Shield and TKS having to go out right toe to toe with the Kurds of Afrin but bringing them nominally back into the Governments Hand)

Likewise the Syrian Government has maintained its own limited presence in Al-Hasakah Governate isolated which at Times pressured by the SDF there, a similar 'Bargaining Chip' could be acquired

[Serge]

Mayadin was never declared by IS to be a capital. In fact ISIS has never declared a capital, period. Official Russian reporting on Syria by ruMOD seems to be getting more and more fantastical and unreliable the more a Syrian victory becomes apparent, strangely enough. I'd write this Qaryatayn story off as another fantasy like their claims today of killing Omar al Shishani(killed 10 times, the last and definitive being by USA in august 2016,confirmed by ISIS) along with a few hundred ISIS in airstrikes , or the claim last week that 1,500 ISIS had been killed in the Homs offensive in 1 day.

Although I did read something interesting regarding Qaryatayn, that in fact it was not ISIS at all but a local ex-FSA group connected to the Tanf rebels, and that ISIS had only claimed the capture for street cred. So perhaps it's not so fantastical after all

[Kooshy]

Well said

[Linda]

I for one find the Turkish involvement very distressing. I'd almost rather it be the Russians.

[turcopolier]

linda

It is both but this spares the Russians the need to commit major ground troops. pl

[Tel]

I predict this will turn into a similar stalemate for the Turks as with the US in Afghanistan. The local Sunni tribalists will not accept Turks ruling over them, but the Turks have superior forces in the conventional sense. This will devolve into simmering tit-for-tat attacks with no clear winner.

Assad will do OK out of this as two of his enemies expend their forces against each other.

[mike]

FB Ali -

Perhaps you are right that there was some hidden motivation in the allegations against the Sultan Murad Division.

On the other hand please note that during the siege of Aleppo the Sultan Murad Division was accused of war crimes by the Syrian regime and Amnesty International and the United Nations. They worked closely with the Nour al-Din al-Zinki headchoppers. They used chlorine gas on civilians (and tried to shift the blame to the Syrian regime). They shelled markets, mosques and civilian residential areas indiscriminately with hell-cannons and home-made rockets.

Later, after their capture of the town of Jarabulus in September 2016, Sultan Murad Division fighters published pictures of themselves torturing prisoners.

They are also part of the same Turkish-backed Syrian Turkmen Brigades that machine gunned that Russian pilot while he was helpless in his parachute.

Does any of the above prove that they are rapists, or exploiters and kidnappers of women in IDP camps? No, of course not. But these accusations should be investigated by the Syrian regime. Or by the Russians, or by AI or the UN or the Hague, or by Sharia courts as long as they are not Turkish backed. Unfortunately that probably won't happen.

[Lemur]

Another aspect of the Russian backed Turkish demarche is Moscow's desire to keep the Persian man under control.

[Dubhaltach]

In reply to FB Ali 07 October 2017 at 01:27 PM

A little searching turned up that the unsourced material that "mike" quoted but didn't bother attributing came from Hawar News Agency.

A few seconds further searching turned up this:

"QUESTIONABLE SOURCE

A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, overt propaganda, poor or no sourcing to credible information and/or is fake news. Fake News is the deliberate attempt to publish hoaxes and/or disinformation for the purpose of profit or influence (Learn More). Sources listed in the Questionable Category may be very untrustworthy and should be fact checked on a per article basis. Please note sources on this list are not considered fake news unless specifically written in the notes section for that source. See all Questionable sources.

Bias: Extreme Left, Propaganda

Notes: Hawar News Agency is an online Kurdish news service based in Al-Hasaka, Syria. The site’s About page says only “ANHA”. The owner of the site is unknown, editor of the site is also unknown. They have a contact page only. Hawar News Agency rarely sources their news pieces at all and in some cases they use questionable sources. According to Pro-Syrian opposition source Verify-sy Hawar News is affiliated with the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and by affiliation they have a strong left wing bias. Further, they indicate rumors as their source under the analysis headline such as this: “There are changes in Aleppo, Idleb and Hama”. Hawar News Agency uses strong loaded language in both sensational headlines and also the body of articles, therefore we rate Hawar News Agency as mixed for factual reporting and a questionable propaganda website with extreme left bias. (M. Huitsing 8/4/2017)

Hawar News Agency - Media Bias/Fact Check

And yes, like others here I'm sure, I have noted that in his response to you that "mike" made yet another series of unsupported allegations.

[Thirdeye]

Apparently some of the sleepers who seized Qaryatayn had previously availed themselves of the reconciliation process and been repatriated to Qaryatayn. The line between ISIS and the other Takfiris in Hama grew pretty blurry if it ever was distinct. Soon after the siege on ISIS in Homs/Hama was established, ISIS attacked towards the Salamiya - Ithrya highway in an apparent attempt to join up with the Takfiris in northern Hama. They were covered by artillery from the northern side. I don't think it's coincident that northern Hama flared up when the ISIS pocket to the south was getting desperate and ISIS was gearing up for their assault on the LOC to Deir Ezzor. The fugitive remnants of the ISIS pocket are attempting to reach the Al Qaeda lines in Hama and that may be a motivating factor in the recent Al Qaeda attack at Abu Daleh in Hama.
The line between ISIS and Al Qaeda is about power more than ideology. ISIS grew to a large extent by offering better pay when they controlled revenue-generating resources that Al Qaeda lacked. Now that ISIS is being shattered the currents are flowing the other way.

[Babak Makkinejad]

I think not, Russia needs Iran and the Shia.

[Barish]

For what it's worth, His Highness Abdullah II implicitly referred to just that zone "out in the eastern desert", read around Rukban camp, in early 2016 in this interview here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lL2_nvAUIbg

In the meantime, keeping in mind the steady progress SAA made at the border with the Jordanian Kingdom in recent weeks, His Highness appears to have decided it best to let his Syrian neighbour clean up the mess Jordan helped create right at its own doorstep.

[Ishmael Zechariah]

Dubhaltach,
"Mike" might be a composite character engaged in kurdish agitprop. The posts do not show a consistent character in stylometric analysis. The tripe in the post above has visible inaccuracies. For example, anyone who knows the region would have picked up a reference to "120 Turkish pounds'.
Ishmael Zechariah

[turcopolier]

IZ

Mike is a specific non-Kurdish American. pl

[Babak Makkinejad]

Americans consider Kurds to be kindred people of the same kind as themselves, torchbearers of Freedom, Progress, and Light against the bad bad governments of Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Turkey.
That they could seriously entertain such funny notions, attest, in my opinion, to the depth of their ignorance of that part of the world.

[Ishmael Zechariah]

Col. Lang,
Thanks for the clarification. Some of what Mike wrote earlier checked out, but his hyperbole quotient has substantially increased in the last several weeks; not what I could reconcile with an ex-military type.
Ishmael Zechariah

[mike]

Ishmael -

I admire the Kurds. I also admire the Turkish people, except Erdogan of course. Talking about composite characters: Erdogan is a composite of the inmates in an insane asylum - the violent ones. Is he really Turkish?

The UN and Amnesty International did in fact accuse the Sultan Murad Division of war crimes. That is a matter of public record. I cannot vouch for sure that the Assad regime itself also accused them, but during the siege of Aleppo there were many Assad supporters who did.

[kooshy]

I guess he's been spending his Turkish pounds