BEIRUT: The Syrian arm of Al-Qaeda attacked a Western-backed rebel group near Aleppo Thursday, the rebel group and an organization monitoring the civil war said, threatening one of the few remaining pockets of the non-jihadi opposition.

The Nusra Front seized positions from the Hazm Movement west of Aleppo, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, adding that four rebel fighters were killed in the clashes. The Nusra Front said it was forced to act after Hazm detained two of its fighters and captured its weapons and offices.

Hazm is one of the leading non-Islamist rebel groups fighting President Bashar Assad in northern Syria, much of which has been seized by the Nusra Front and ISIS – an offshoot of Al-Qaeda that controls a third of Syria.

Hazm has received what it describes as small amounts of military aid from foreign states opposed to Assad, including U.S.-made anti-tank missiles. But it has lost ground to better armed and financed jihadis: Nusra drove Hazm from the next-door Idlib province in October as part of its drive against the Syria Rebel Front, another FSA group that has received TOW anti-tank missiles and western training.

While U.S.-led airstrikes have focused on pushing back ISIS in eastern and northern Syria, the Nusra Front has deepened its influence in the northwest.

“They want to put an end to the Free Syrian Army,” a Hazm official said by telephone.

“There have been a number of confrontations before, but this is the biggest,” said the official, who said he was speaking from northern Syria. The Nusra Front was mobilizing reinforcements, meaning Hazm would have to withdraw fighters from front lines with government forces.

The Nusra Front said in a statement it tried to avoid escalation with Hazm but the group recently detained two Nusra fighters. “The Front will take the final road to free its soldiers,” it said.

The Syrian military has meanwhile waged its own campaign against ISIS, making gains in the last two days near an air base in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor, the Observatory’s Rami Abdel-Rahman said.

But in Aleppo province, Syrian activists said government airstrikes killed at least a dozen people in a northern town held by ISIS, anti-government activists said.

The Observatory said “several” airstrikes targeted the city of Al-Bab. It said the dead included women and children and that the toll was likely to rise as many people were wounded.

The Aleppo Media Center, a local activist group, said 15 people were killed in four airstrikes that targeted a crowded sheep market. Conflicting death tolls are common after such strikes.

Human rights groups and local activists say government forces often show disregard for civilians when targeting suspected militants.

Kurdish forces drove the last ISIS fighters from the border town of Ain al-Arab, also known as Kobani, earlier this week. Abdel-Rahman said the Kurdish YPG militia advanced into five nearby villages in the last three days, but that the jihadi group continues to control some 350 small villages in the area.

The Observatory said 22 ISIS fighters were killed as the group continued to fall back, while the jihadis also fired mortar bombs at Kurdish positions, killing one person and wounding a dozen others.

 

 

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2015/Jan-30/285798-nusra-front-attacks-fsa-rebels-in-aleppo-kills-four.ashx