ISIS, Syrian Rebels Forge ‘Nonaggression’ Pact Near Damascus
AFP reports that “Syrian rebels and jihadists from the Islamic State [of Iraq and Syria] have agreed a non-aggression pact for the first time” in a Damascus suburb.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition-backed monitoring group, said the cease-fire deal “was agreed between [ISIS] and moderate and Islamist rebels in Hajar al-Aswad, south of the capital. Under the deal, ‘the two parties will respect a truce until a final solution is found and they promise not to attack each other because they consider the principal enemy to be the [Alawite] regime.’”
Meanwhile, the wire also reports that Secretary of State John Kerry said the U.S. will not coordinate air attacks on ISIS with Assad’s regime, “but will seek to ensure their forces do not come into conflict.”
“We will certainly want to deconflict and make certain that they’re not about to do something that they might regret even more seriously,” Kerry told CBS’s Face the Nation. “But we’re not going to coordinate, it’s not a cooperative effort.” He also said that “all bases were covered” in the U.S.’s fight against ISIS.
And the Los Angeles Times profiles the various Syrian rebel groups operating on the ground and their ability to successfully back the U.S. when it commences airstrikes against ISIS in eastern parts of the country.
Obama “has called on Congress to authorize $500 million to train and arm Syrian rebels to become America’s partners. But who are these groups, and to what degree can the U.S. rely on them?” writes Raka Abdulrahim.
“The U.S. has already begun supporting some of them, sending non-lethal aid as well as covert weapons shipments. These select rebels have been vetted to ensure they have secular and moderate views that satisfy the U.S. But other groups are considered by the American government to be terrorists who pose a threat to the U.S.”
To Stop ISIS in Syria, Support Aleppo
International Crisis Group’s Jean-Marie Guéhenno and Noah Bonsey argue in a New York Times op-ed that successfully stopping ISIS requires shifting U.S. military focus to Aleppo, on which the militant group is making a steady advance.
“Though Western attention is drawn to Iraq, it is Syria that has witnessed the most significant ISIS gains since June. It is Aleppo, Syria’s largest metropolitan area, that presents ISIS’ best opportunity for expanding its claimed caliphate,” they write. “An effective strategy for halting, and eventually reversing, ISIS’ expansion should begin there, and soon.
“Given Aleppo’s strategic and symbolic importance as a rebel stronghold, the very viability of mainstream anti-Assad forces in northern Syria is at stake in this battle on two fronts. The vital significance of this is that it is they who must take the lead on the ground in rolling back ISIS gains in Syria.”