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Thursday, April 10, 2014
Excerpts: Hizbullah claims attack on Israeli troops.Competing terror groups in Syria. Syria stalemate April 10, 2014

Excerpts: Hizbullah claims attack on Israeli troops.Competing terror groups
in Syria. Syria stalemate April 10, 2014

+++SOURCE: Naharnet(Lebanon) 10 April ’14:”Israel Calls for U.N.Action
Against Hizbullah after Nasrallah’s Claims
SUBJECT:Hizbullah claims attack on Israeli troops
FULL TEXTIsrael has asked the United Nations to take action against
Hizbullah after the party's secretary-general, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, said
that his group was behind a blast that targeted Israeli troops last month.

Israel's U.N. Ambassador Ron Prosor said in a letter to U.N. Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council that Nasrallah’s admission is
further evidence that Hizbullah continues to operate south of the Litani
River in violation of Resolution 1701 that ended the 2006 war between the
two sides.

"Yes, the explosion in the Shebaa Farms that Hizbullah has not claimed until
now was the work of the resistance, which means the work of Hizbullah,"
Nasrallah told As Safir daily earlier this week.

The explosion on March 14 came around a month after Israeli warplanes
carried out air strikes in the Lebanese-Syrian border area of Janta that
were believed to have targeted its positions.

"This was not the reply, but this was part of the reply," Nasrallah said.

Tensions have been running high between Israel and Hizbullah for months,
with the Jewish state warning it would carry out strikes to prevent the
group from obtaining advanced weaponry

+++SOURCE:Naharnet (Lebanon) 10 April ’14: “Syria Qaida Loses Ground to
Jihadist Rivals on Iraq Border”, Agence France Presse
SUBJECT: Competing terror groups in Syria
EXCERPTS:Syria's al-Qaida affiliate lost ground to its jihadist rivals
around a town on the Iraqi border on Thursday in heavy fighting that left 24
people dead, a monitoring group said.

Fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), a cross-border
group which has been disowned by the al-Qaida leadership, launched a
three-pronged assault on positions held by al-Qaida affiliate Al-Nusra Front
and its allies, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

ISIL fighters were driven out of Albu Kamal in heavy fighting earlier this
year and are seeking to link up with their comrades over the border in Iraq,
Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told Agence France Presse.

"Since dawn there has been fierce fighting inside Albu Kamal. ISIL is
advancing and has taken control of several neighborhoods of the town which
were previously held by Al-Nusra Front and Islamist brigades," he said . .
.

+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 10 April ’14: “Hizbollah confident in Assad;West
resigned to Syria Stalemate”, Reuters
SUBJECT: Syria stalemate
QUOTE:”Hizbollah said . . . (Assad) will go on ruling Syria after fighting
rebels to a standstill”

FULL TEXT:BEIRUT — Bashar Al Assad’s Lebanese ally Hizbollah said his
Western foes must now accept he will go on ruling Syria after fighting
rebels to a standstill — a “reality” to which his foreign enemies seem
increasingly resigned.

Echoing recent bullish talk coming out of Damascus, Sheikh Naim Qassem,
deputy leader of the Iranian-backed Shiite militia which is supporting Assad
in combat, told Reuters that the president retained popular support among
many of Syria’s diverse religious communities and would shortly be
re-elected.

“There is a practical Syrian reality that the West should deal with — not
with its wishes and dreams, which proved to be false,” Qassem said during a
meeting with Reuters journalists at a Hizbollah office in the group’s
southern Beirut stronghold.

He said the United States and its Western allies were in disarray and lacked
a coherent policy on Syria — reflecting the quandary that Western officials
acknowledge they face since the pro-democracy protests they supported in
2011 became a war that has drawn Al Qaeda and other militants to the rebel
cause.

Syria’s fractious opposition — made up of guerrillas inside the country and
a largely impotent political coalition in exile — had, he said, proved
incapable of providing an alternative to four decades of rule by Assad and
his late father before him.

“This is why the option is clear. Either to have an understanding with
Assad, to reach a result, or to keep the crisis open with President Assad
having the upper hand in running the country,” said the bearded and turbaned
cleric.

Qassem’s comments follow an account from another Assad ally, Russian former
prime minister Sergei Stepashin, who said after meeting him last week that
the Syrian leader felt secure and expected heavy fighting to end this year.

Officials said this week that preparations would begin this month for the
presidential election — a move that seems to reflect a degree of optimism in
the capital and which may well end with Assad claiming a popular mandate
that he would use to resist UN-backed efforts to negotiate a transition of
power.

Hizbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah also said this week that Assad is
no longer at risk and that military gains mean the danger of Syria
fragmenting was also receding.

Western resignation

It is a view of Assad that — quietly — seems to be gaining ground in Western
capitals. Calling it bad news for Syrians, the French foreign ministry said
this week: “Maybe he will be the sole survivor of this policy of mass
crimes”.

France, which last year was preparing to join US military action that was
eventually aborted, now rules out force and called the stalled talks on
“transition” the “only plan” — a view US officials say is shared in
Washington, notably among military chiefs who see Assad as preferable to
sectarian chaos.

While rebels do not admit defeat, leaders like Badr Jamous of the Syrian
National Coalition accept that without foreign intervention “this stalemate
will go on”. A US official, asked about a deadlock that would leave Assad in
control of much of Syria, conceded: “This has become a drawn-out conflict.”

Assad, 48, has weathered an armed insurgency which started with protests in
2011 and descended into a civil war that has sucked in regional powers,
including Shiite Iran and Hizbollah who back the Alawite president and
Sunni states like Saudi Arabia and Qatar behind the rebels.

With Russia blocking a UN mandate, and voters showing no appetite for war
after losses in Afghanistan and Iraq, Western governments have held back
from the kind of military engagement that could have toppled the well-armed
Syrian leader.

More than 150,000 people have been killed in three years, as Assad has lost
the oil-producing and agricultural east and much of the north, including
parts of Syria’s largest city, Aleppo.

But he did not suffer the fate of other autocrats in the Arab Spring,
whether the presidents of Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen or Muammar Qadhafi, the
Libyan leader toppled and killed by rebels who rode into Tripoli under cover
of Western air power.

Instead, he has clawed back control near Damascus, where a year ago rebels
hoped for a decisive assault, and the centre of the country which links the
capital to the coastal stronghold of Assad’s Alawite minority. His troops,
backed by Hizbollah fighters, took another key town on Wednesday.

Though as much as half the country is being fought over, Assad could hope to
hold at least a roughly southwestern half, including most of the built-up
heartlands near the coast, and more than half of the pre-war population of
23 million.

This leaves Western powers reflecting on a perceived loss of influence in
the Middle East. Many now see a new strategy of “containing” Assad — and the
fallout from a bitter war that has created millions of refugees and legions
of hardened guerrillas.

“The US has a stated policy of regime change, but it has never devoted the
resources to effect that change,” said Andrew Exum, a former US official who
worked on Middle East issues at the Pentagon. “The de facto US strategy of
containment is very well suited for what is likely to be a very long war.”

‘Stalemate will continue’

Qassem said the United States, which backed away from military action in
September after blaming Assad for gassing civilians, was hamstrung by fears
over the dominance in rebel ranks of Al Qaeda’s Syrian branch, the Nusra
Front, and another group, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

“America is in a state of confusion. On the one hand it does not want the
regime to stay and on the other it cannot control the opposition which is
represented by ISIL and Nusra,” he said.

“This is why the latest American position was to leave the situation in
Syria in a state of attrition.”

President Barack Obama said last month that the United States had reached
“limits” after the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and questioned whether years
of military engagement in Syria would produce a better outcome there.

Qassem said: “I expect that the stalemate will continue in the Syrian crisis
because of the lack of an international and regional decision to facilitate
a political solution.”

UN-mediated talks at Geneva failed in February to bridge a gulf between
Assad’s government and opponents who insist that Assad must make way for a
government of national unity.

Western and regional powers who support the Syrian opposition say it would
be a “parody of democracy” to hold an election in the midst of a conflict
which has displaced more than 9 million people and divided the country
across frontlines.

Syria’s electoral law effectively rules out participation by opponents who
have fled the country in fear of Assad’s police — candidates must have lived
in Syria continuously for 10 years.

“My conviction is that Assad will run and will win because he has popular
support in Syria from all the sects — Sunnis and secularists,” Qassem said.
“I believe the election will take place on its due date and Assad will run
and win decisively.”

Fear of hardline Islamists has undermined support for some rebels even among
the 75 per cent Sunni majority, and bolstered support for Assad among his
fellow Alawites, and Christians.

Qassem said it was too soon to speak of Hizbollah pulling out of Syria,
despite an increase in Sunni-Shiite tensions within Lebanon caused by the
intervention across the border of a movement that is Lebanon’s most
accomplished military force and also holds Cabinet seats in the government
in Beirut.

“Until now we consider our presence in Syria necessary and fundamental,”
Qassem said.

“But when circumstances change, this will be a military and political matter
that requires a new assessment.”

“But if the situation stays as is and the circumstances are similar, we will
remain where we should be.”

=========================================================
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA

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