IS

[Tigranes]

While we discuss this theoretical issues here, IS is gaining ground:

Islamic State fighters backed by tanks have captured during the past 24 hours, 21 Kurdish villages in Northern Iraq near the Turkish border.

According to British-based Syria Observatory for Human Rights, the militant Since Wednesday, Islamic State militants appear to have gained the upper hand in Syria's northern Kurdish region of Kobani, also known as Ayn Arab, overrunning 21 Kurdish villages, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

“This is a very important advance for them,” Rami Abdulrahman, the Observatory's founder, told Reuters.

Redur Xelil, spokesman for the main armed Kurdish group in Syria, the YPG, said Islamic State fighters had encircled Kobani.

The group was using tanks, rockets and artillery in the attack. “We call on world powers to move to halt this barbaric assault by ISIS,” he told Reuters via Skype.

 

[r16]

I get it that Turkey does not like Assad for whatever reason and did not mind moderate rebels to travel to Syria from Turkey. They feel more worried now when IS rose its ugly head. But suppose there were no IS, and moderate rebels would win Civil War at some point: will that kind of Syriaa make Turkey happy? Moderate-to extreme Islamic Arabic state right next door?

completely wrong in the sense that it's well known Turkish airlines were chartered to carry all those "good looking types" from all over the world . When an THY airlines goes to Afghanistan and brings 200 people -with approximately half of them with names deleted from official US files for that day- all you will hear from the Americans is that it's another profit year for the National Airlines , so Turks must shut the ____ up . The worries as they exist are merely about the "Revolution" being stolen by other countries so that Ankara can not have a morsel to silence people after Kurds get their State including this 25% of Turkey . Or something .

to this end we just love the entire Human Rights issue in countries to our South which we can sort of invade . Yesterday's "fighting" brought 3000 or so would be refugees to our borders and they were kept out not because they were Kurds but Ankara wants to present it that there is like an immense humanitarian disaster at hand and the America must come and invade Syria and give the carcass to Ankara . Naturally the world will make this look like Ankara has not been honest to Kurds and hence banning their right to education in their own tongue . Resulting in daily clashes where the Police locks those three schools the seperatist party opened before sun down and seperatists set fire to 6 or 10 schools every night . So Ankara will look like that it has asked ISIL to teach the Kurds a lesson . And so on .

truly hurts and amuses at the same time to see Turkish commentators making so much "sense" that a No-Fly Zone is the way to victory of -ahem- Human Rights and God's Justice on Earth and no boots will be on the ground . But , to protect those operations , the 4th Generation jets (which supposedly never lost to MiGs and the like since 1980s) somehow need allied ground forces in the target country to protect them from those MiGs and the like anyhow . Got nothing , understood zilch ? Don't worry , the World has no intention of hearing Ankara anyhow .

 

[Tigranes]

Why is it often so hard to understand what your position is? Perhaps numerating questions and answers will help.
1. What is the history of bad blood between Assad and Turkey.
2. If Assad go it may mean Kurds will get their own state in Syria and can merge with the one in Iraq (after IS is beaten) . The last part of KUrdistan is in Turkey. Is this ok with Turkey?
3. Don't you think there is some silent pact between IS and Turkey -- don't cross our borders and we will let your guys to cross your borders from our side and buy cheep gasoline from your captured oil wells.

 

[Borachio]

Why is it often so hard to understand what your position is?

This is a question that has been baffling people for some time, I think.

r16 uses a lot of code. And it's not easy to tell when he's being serious. Mostly he isn't, is my best guess.

 

[gay_Aleks]

In a chilling new development, Habeeb Al Sadr warned that Pope Francis could be on IS' list of targets, ahead of his visit to Albania this weekend and Turkey in November.

This will be the pontiff's first visit to a Muslim-majority country.

Mr Al Sadr told Italian newspaper La Nazione: "What has been declared by the self-declared Islamic State is clear – they want to kill the Pope. The threats against the Pope are credible.

"I believe they could try to kill him during one of his overseas trips or even in Rome.

"There are members of Isil who are not Arabs but Canadian, American, French, British, also Italians.

"Isil could engage any of these to commit a terrorist attack in Europe."

Apparently.

 

[Tigranes]

Dozens of Turkish hostages being held by the radical Islamic State group have been released. The hostages arrived in Turkey in the early hours of Saturday, local time, after being held for 101 days.

The details of how the hostages came to be released remain unclear. The prime minister said the intelligence service carried out the operation with their own methods.

There had been reports that the Islamic State group had been demanding as much as a $100 million ransom.

Ankara had cited the hostages as a factor limiting Turkey's participation in actions against the militants. NATO member, with 2nd largest army in Alliance , Turkey borders Syria and Iraq, and is seen as a key member of the international coalition against the Islamic State fighters.

 

[r16]

the ISIL attack seems somewhat imposing , allowing the seperatists to mount demonstrations to establish a pattern for the removal of "borders" even if ı will not deny that the fear of the civilians is fully justified . Turkish TVs didn't carry it but Al Crusading had a declaration from the seperatist's top organization calling for not their "fighters" but the "youth" from Turkey to join ; mere "support" was not enough . Turkish TVs rather concentrate on the idea that there will be hunger strikes and supposedly human shields . The last is kinda absurd with the simultenous reports that there has been yet another mass execution of some 300 captives ; as if ISIL cares for negative publicity. It's just proof that the seperatists can raise a levy or something, simply as a yet another show of their "statehood" . If there was any danger at all America would have been almost nuking the ISIL , right ? Now that , a Congregation TV reports the Syrian Kurds had just claimed having 50 000 warriors ...

the fighting also proves a little defeat for the designs of Ankara as well even if the claim would be seriously debateable . As previously noted the idea was to keeping the "massive" refugee events on the Syrian side of the border to create a limited number of buffer zones which somehow would lead to clashes with the Syrian forces ; hence Article 5 of NATO ; hence a glorious conquest . As American pressure mounted the borders were opened (since Barack Hussein readily snickers whenever he hears the Turkish stand on such matters) and the trickle of people who were waiting just across the wire barrier grew into a flood . It's reported 70 000 people crossed in two days . Not that they are much pushed out but everybody wants to be ensure they won't be caught .

and of course this is sorta disasterous for the Goverment of the Little Imperialist . Thundering about the might and right of this New Turkey and his policy declarations about the buffer zone not a week old . Hence the "saving" of the hostages from the clutches of ISIL . With the all the nicesties of a well and long prepared PR campaign . Or the Turkish Foreign Ministry really stocks a fine bunch of imbeciles with the chief Consulate guy showing "surprise" at the phone call from the Little Imperialist as he crossed the border and saying "My Prime Minister, did you know?" To be fair it can only be guessed whether ISIL was guaranteed "insider" influence when this mighty glorious American operation begins or was it already fixed with the consulate falling on the 11th of June and the people "rescued" on the 101st day . The Little Imperialist had already promised "success" no later than the first week of October when the Islamic festivities begins . Naturally it's milked as much as possible with stories of how the Intelligence service spurned offers of help from America , the PM declares it as proof of the power of the "Great" Turkey ; having gone up he needs something extra as the Little Imperialist abuses the adjective of "New" ...

though the peak was of course the "imprompto" political rally where they started playing a musical piece from the 70s . About the beauties of the country , my disbelief was due to the thing it's now well known that the melody comes from an Israeli folk song ... Doubly impossible , if you will . And yeah , the Little Imperialist immediately arrived , cutting the song in the middle ! Ah the glorious symbolisms and he -of course- goes onto declare this success proves everybody should 'accept' "this nation" and kinda agree to be hand in hand ... This Nation refers to the 50% who votes for the A-K-P . And ı don't think he much worries about any suggestion that it was Ankara that made the consulate fall ; it proves power , right ?

addition : Seems am wrong , they have been playing the song continiously . Saw it on late night TV news as ı was drafting .


addition 2 : the number of refugees is now 100 000 over 3 days , supposedly a barrier that will lead to the imposition of buffer zones ; the PM is New York for UN meetings ; it might be useful if the operations start soon so that yet another diplomatic success can be claimed . To prevent this it now appears the Syrian Airforce has downed a bridge that leads to Süleyman Şah , so that ISIL can not give an excuse by taking over the outpost there .

 

[Tigranes]

ı

What character do you use for "I"? It's not | and not i

 

[Ajidica]

He is using the Turkish undotted i.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dotted_and_dotless_I

No idea why, but that wasn't the question you asked.

 

[kramerfan86]

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-defense-secretary-u-s-in-syria-too-late-left-iraq-too-soon/

I grow tired of the hawks acting like ISIS is some sort of evidence we should have stuck our nose into the Syrian Civil War sooner. We stuck our noses in Libya, armed the moderates and helped them, did that stop radicals from getting involved? But no, idiots like Panetta act like it would have been some magic bullet that made everything pixie dust and wonderful.

This is the line that concerns me about the idiots running these armies:

I think the president's concern, and I understand it, was that he had a fear that if we started providing weapons, we wouldn't know where those weapons would wind up... My view was, "You have to begin somewhere."

Consequences be damned! You have to begin somewhere! Worry about the end game after the game starts!

 

[Gucumatz]

I don't think Panetta was wrong however. If you get involved in an emerging civil war, typically its best to get involved sooner than later to have influence. Civil Wars/Revolutions are by nature messy, almost every civil war/revolution in history didn't stop being "messy" after initial victory either and Libya is clearly no exception. And although the "moderates" in Libya have been weakened, they are still present and a significant force within Libya even in the continuing partisan fighting - unlike in Syria.

Would you argue that arming the remaining rebels now in Syria is better than if we had armed and trained Syrian rebels near the start? I stated in the first thread on Syria when the civil war began that if we waited too long, there would be no real point in arming in the rebels [in regards to spread of influence].

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I think our plan to deal with ISIS is focusing on the wrong people, it should be focused on supporting the Kurds in my humble opinion. They are at the front lines of this conflict as well, the Turks aren't going to provide any significant help anyways, they have consistently been friendly and allies with the US for years now. And besides, the Iraqi government has been constantly delegating power and autonomy to the Kurds since the crisis began - this would be the perfect time to focus defeating ISIS primarily through the Kurds. Most of the villages seized by ISIS in recent days have been Kurdish. Almost overnight through further support the Kurds could grow into a regional power and ally of the US with the proper help and by a mile they would be more reliable than remaining factions in Syria.

 

[kramerfan86]

Kurds dont have the manpower to actually drive out ISIS from Syria unfortunately. Out of all the groups in iraq and Syria though they are certainly the most desirable.

 

[Tigranes]

In the time when thousands of people are being killed by IS and hundreds of thousands become refuges senseless destruction of a church, even a special one, will not get any attention, but I just wanted to post this sad news here for the record:

DER ZOR, Syria (Armenian Weekly)—The Islamic State for Iraq and Syria–ISIS–forces destroyed the Armenian Genocide Memorial Church in Der Zor, news agencies in the Middle East reported.
The reports surfaced as Armenia was celebrating the 23rd anniversary of its independence on Sept. 21.
Armenia’s Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian issued a statement condemning the destruction of the church, which housed the remains of victims of the Armenian Genocide, calling it a “horrible barbarity.”

The church was built in 1989-1990 (under horrible. horrible Assad, T.), and consecrated a year later. A genocide memorial and a museum housing remains of the victims of the genocide was also built in the church compound.
Thousands of Armenians from Syria and neighboring countries gathered at the memorial every year on April 24 to commemorate the genocide.
Many refer to Der Zor as the Auschwitz of the Armenian Genocide.
Hundreds of thousands of Armenians perished in Der Zor and the surrounding desert during the genocide of 1915. In summer 1916 alone, more than 200,000 Armenians, mostly women and children, were brutally massacred by Ottoman Turkish gendarmes and bands from the region.

 

[r16]

the actual usage for the Kurds is supposed to be post-ISIL ; considering the US is still stuck in 2010 and still advocates a freakin' Turkish-Arab war to thin the ranks .

 

[Loppan Torkel]

Kurds dont have the manpower to actually drive out ISIS from Syria unfortunately. Out of all the groups in iraq and Syria though they are certainly the most desirable.

Funny how ISIS was regarded as a little group of terrorists with no support and how their little quest would soon die out.
I wonder if the Turks and perhaps the Iranians are considering a little land grab of the Kurd-dominated areas in Iraq and Syria. It's been a pretty popular thing to do the last year.


Anyway - I can understand that the development in the Middle East come as an utter surprise to the liberals and the left-wingers. Again. It's just doesn't fit their ideological beliefs.

 

[r16]

just to be fair the Left/Liberal failures are practically nothing compared to the fixations of the Right , especially from an American perspective ; considering without America nothing happens in the world despite all the talk to the contrary .

 

[Tahuti]

Funny how ISIS was regarded as a little group of terrorists with no support and how their little quest would soon die out.
I wonder if the Turks and perhaps the Iranians are considering a little land grab of the Kurd-dominated areas in Iraq and Syria. It's been a pretty popular thing to do the last year.

ISIS was always a thing since the deposition of Saddam and they pretty much controlled all of Southwestern Iraq which was regarded as an empty desert with no relevance. Turned out it was apparently relevant when Assad had to put up with the Syrian opposition which gave ISIS its opening. Everything came together at the right place at the right time: The US deposed Saddam, then when Assad got into trouble, ISIS had the right ingredients for success.

 

[Gucumatz]

A side thing - some Islamist groups/individuals across the world are associating with ISIS. In Algeria a French citizen was taken hostage and threatened to be beheaded, in the Philippines 2 German citizens have been taken hostage with similar threats if ransom isn't paid, and other groups internationally are threatening to take western hostages in support of ISIS

 

[Flying Pig]

Petty criminals and 'terrorist' groups often like to associate themselves with mainstream terrorism because it gets them taken seriously: people might pay a large ransom to 'ISIS-backed terrorists' than they wouldn't to 'some guys from Bradford in balaclavas' - plus the guys from Bradford will feel a lot more intimidating and powerful when people are scared of the name they're throwing around. More sinisterly, the police have a lot of standard protocols for dealing with terrorists, and often the people calling themselves 'terrorists' know this and have a good idea of what they are. Calling yourself a terrorist makes the police more predictable.

 

[brennan]

Anyway - I can understand that the development in the Middle East come as an utter surprise to the liberals and the left-wingers. Again. It's just doesn't fit their ideological beliefs.

How/why?