Military Skill, Terrorist Technique Fuel Success of ISIS
Ben Hubbard and Eric Schmitt of the New York Times report that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has quietly built “an effective management structure of mostly middle-aged Iraqis overseeing departments of finance, arms, local governance, military operations and recruitment.”
Its leadership team includes several former officers from Saddam Hussein’s army, and the pedigree of that leadership “helps explain its battlefield successes: Its leaders augmented traditional military skill with terrorist techniques refined through years of fighting American troops, while also having deep local knowledge and contacts. ISIS is in effect a hybrid of terrorists and an army.”
Meanwhile, Reuters reports that military strikes against ISIS in Syria would face “formidable” risk.
“While it is unclear how soon strikes might be launched, Obama’s go-ahead for aerial reconnaissance over Syria has raised expectations he will approve the attacks rather than back off as he did last year after threatening to strike Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces,” the wire writes.
“Any air offensive would likely focus on Islamic State’s leadership and positions around the city of Raqqa in their stronghold of eastern Syria, and border areas that have served as staging grounds for Islamist forces that have swept into Iraq and taken over a third of the country.
“Efforts to hit the right targets in Syria will be more difficult than in Iraq, hindered by a shortage of reliable on-the-ground intelligence, in contrast to northern Iraq where Iraqi and Kurdish forces provided intelligence.”
Reuters also says the National Security Council is aware of reports that a second American has been killed while fighting with ISIS in Syria, after Douglas MacAuthur McCain became the first known U.S. citizen to die while doing battle with the militant group.
Rebels Take Control of Crossing in the Golan Heights
The New York Times reports that extremist opposition factions, including al-Qaida affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra, have taken control of the Quneitra crossing point in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
“The move could bring Islamist forces within 200 yards of territory controlled by Israel,” the paper says. One activist said that “a coalition of Islamists, including members of the Qaida-linked Nusra Front, opened an assault on the government-held crossing early Wednesday. The status of a United Nations force that is supposed to monitor the crossing point was unclear.
“The Israeli military said one soldier and an Israeli civilian were wounded by ‘errant fire’ from the clashes at Quneitra on Wednesday, prompting an artillery barrage against two Syrian army positions in the Golan Heights — the latest of several occasions when Syria’s civil war has spilled into Israel, prompting retaliation. Israel has said it has no interest in further involvement in the fighting.”
Heavy Use of Banned Cluster Bombs Reported in Syria
The Times also reports that the Cluster Munition Coalition, a monitoring group, has said that “cluster bombs, outlawed munitions that kill and maim indiscriminately, have caused more casualties in the Syrian civil war than in the 2006 Lebanon conflict, when Israel’s heavy use of the weapons hastened the treaty banning them two years later.”
In its annual report, the group said that it had documented at least 264 deaths and 1,320 injuries in Syria from cluster bombs used in 2012 and 2013, and “hundreds more were recorded in the first half of 2014.”
“Ninety-seven percent of the dead in Syria were civilians … and the number of such injuries doubled in 2013 from the year before, suggesting that the weapons had been increasingly deployed in more heavily populated areas. Although the report did not specify whether government forces or insurgents were using them, munitions experts have said that only the Syrian military has the technical capability.”
Suggested Reads from Our Editorial Team
WSJ: Islamic State Fills Coffers From Illicit Economy in Syria, Iraq
AP: U.N. Panel: Crimes Against Humanity Spread in Syria, Include Possible Gas Attack
NPR: U.S. Officials Try to Gauge Threat From American Fighters in Syria
Huffington Post: ISIS Says It’s Burning Marijuana Fields in Syria