Majorityrights News > Category: ISIL

What stands logistically in the way is that the Kurds seek a homeland, and that would entail a piece of Syria, which Assad does not want to relinquish. However, the Kurds do seem prepared to negotiate with Assad for the right, somehow, to live alongside the Syrians, within what Assad would like to maintain or re-claim as greater Syria - parts of which Assad was forced to abandon in 2012. We should encourage their reconciliation and alliance; and for other ethnonations to ally with them despite the shit-hole nations of Turkey and Israel in opposition.

The Guardian,  23 Feb 2018: “Why are world leaders backing this brutal attack against Kurdish Afrin?”

Islamist militants – with Turkish army support – are wreaking havoc with a pocket of peace and sanity in the Syrian war.

‘Afrin’s population doubled during the conflict, as hundreds of thousands of mostly Arab refugees had come to shelter with its original, overwhelmingly Kurdish, population.’

Three years ago the world watched a ragtag band of men and women fighters in the Syrian town of Kobane, most armed only with Kalashnikovs, hold off a vast army of Islamist militants with tanks, artillery and overwhelming logistical superiority. The defenders insisted they were acting in the name of revolutionary feminist democracy. The Islamist fighters vowed to exterminate them for that very reason. When Kobane’s defenders won, it was widely hailed as the closest one can come, in the contemporary world, to a clear confrontation of good against evil.

Today, exactly same thing is happening again. Except this time, world powers are firmly on the side of the aggressors. In a bizarre twist, those aggressors seem to have convinced key world leaders and public opinion-makers that Kobane’s citizens are “terrorists” because they embrace a radical version of ecology, democracy and women’s rights.

Turkey’s attack on Syrian Kurds could overturn the entire region.

The region in question is Afrin, defended by the same YPG and YPJ (People’s Protection and Women’s Protection Units) who defended Kobane, and who afterwards were the only forces in Syria willing to take the battle to the heartland of Islamic State, losing thousands of combatants in the battle for its capital, Raqqa.

An isolated pocket of peace and sanity in the Syrian civil war, famous only for the beauty of its mountains and olive groves, Afrin’s population had almost doubled during the conflict as hundreds of thousands of mostly Arab refugees had come to shelter with its original, overwhelmingly Kurdish population.

At the same time its inhabitants had taken advantage of their peace and stability to develop the democratic principles embraced throughout the majority Kurdish regions of north Syria, known as Rojava. Local decisions were devolved to neighbourhood assemblies in which everyone could participate; other parts of Rojava insisted on strict gender parity, with every office having co-chairs, male and female, in Afrin, two-thirds of public offices are held by women.

Turkey’s attack on Syrian Kurds could overturn the entire region.

Today, this democratic experiment is the object of an entirely unprovoked attack by Islamist militias including Isis and al-Qaida veterans, and members of Turkish death squads such as the notorious Grey Wolves, backed by the Turkish army’s tanks, F16 fighters, and helicopter gunships. Like Isis before them, the new force seems determined to violate all standards of behaviour, launching napalm attacks on villagers, attacking dams – even, like Isis, blowing up irreplaceable archaeological monuments. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the president of Turkey, has announced, “We aim to give Afrin back to its rightful owners”, in a thinly veiled warning to ethnically cleanse the region of its Kurdish inhabitants. And only today it emerged that a convoy heading to Afrin carrying food and medicine was shelled by Turkish forces.

Remarkably, the YPG and YPJ have so far held off the invaders. But they have done so without so much as the moral support of a single major world power. Even the US, the presence of whose forces prevents Turkey from invading those territories in the east, where the YPG and YPJ are still engaged in combat with Isis, has refused to lift a finger to defend Afrin. The British foreign secretary Boris Johnson has gone so far as to insist that “Turkey has the right to want to keep its borders secure” – by which logic he would have no objection if France were to seize control of Dover.

The result is bizarre. Western leaders who regularly excoriate Middle Eastern regimes for their lack of democratic and women’s rights – even, as George W Bush famously did with the Taliban, using it as justification for military invasion – appear to have decided that going too far in the other direction is justifiable grounds for attack.

To understand how this happened, one must go back to the 1990s, when Turkey was engaged in a civil war with the military arm of the Kurdistan Workers’ party, or PKK, then a Marxist-Leninist organisation calling for a separate Kurdish state. Whether the PKK was ever a terrorist organisation, in the sense of bombing marketplaces and the like, is very much a matter of contention, but there is no doubt that the guerrilla war was a bloody business, and terrible things happened on both sides. About the turn of the millennium, the PKK abandoned the demand for a separate state. It called a unilateral ceasefire, pressing for peace talks to negotiate both regional autonomy for Kurds and a broader democratisation of Turkish society.

This transformation affected the Kurdish freedom movement across the Middle East. Those inspired by the movement’s imprisoned leader, Abdullah Öcalan, began calling for a radical decentralisation of power and opposition to ethnic nationalism of all sorts.

Turkey starts ground incursion into Kurdish-controlled Afrin in Syria - Read more

The Turkish government responded with an intense lobbying campaign to have the PKK designated a “terrorist organisation” (which it had not been before). By 2001 it had succeeded, and the PKK was placed on the EU, US, and UN “terror list”.

Never has such a decision so wreaked havoc with the prospect of peace. It allowed the Turkish government to arrest thousands of activists, journalists, elected Kurdish officials – even the leadership of the country’s second largest opposition party – all on claims of “terrorist” sympathies, and with barely a word of protest from Europe or America. Turkey now has more journalists in prison than any other country.

The designation has created a situation of Orwellian madness, allowing the Turkish government to pour millions into western PR firms to smear anyone who calls for greater civil rights as “terrorists”. Now, in the final absurdity, it has allowed world governments to sit idly by while Turkey launches an unprovoked assault on one of the few remaining peaceful corners of Syria – even though the only actual connection its people have to the PKK is an enthusiasm for the philosophy of its imprisoned leader Öcalan. It cannot be denied – as Turkish propagandists endlessly point out – that portraits of Öcalan, and his books, are common there. But ironically what that philosophy consists of is simply an embrace of direct democracy, ecology, and a radical version of women’s empowerment.

The religious extremists who surround the current Turkish government know perfectly well that Rojava doesn’t threaten them militarily. It threatens them by providing an alternative vision of what life in the region could be like. Above all, they feel it is critical to send the message to women across the Middle East that if they rise up for their rights, let alone rise up in arms, the likely result is that they will be maimed and killed, and none of the major powers will raise an objection. There is a word for such a strategy. It’s called “terrorism” – a calculated effort to cause terror. The question is, why is the rest of the world cooperating?

• David Graeber is professor of anthropology at the LSE and author of Debt: The First 5000 years; he was involved in the Global Justice Movement and Occupy Wall Street

Related Story: Watch for The PKK as a revolutionary group fighting for ethnonationalism

While growing up a child refugee in Britain he acquired the accent that would have him nicknamed among the infam four, ‘the Beatles’, heard promoting the mania of their terror campaign…

The Infam Four: El Shafee Elsheikh ( far right), one of the four infamous ISIS murderers, identified as a “child refugee” accepted into Britain. The other three were also admitted into Britain through legal immigration channels.

TNO, One of the four ISIS murderers infamous for appearing in the “Jihadi John” decapitation videos has been revealed as a former “child refugee” granted “asylum” in Britain through that country’s open doors “asylum” policy.

The former “child refugee” has been named as El Shafee Elsheikh, whose family managed to swindle their way into Britain—and UK citizenship—by claiming to be “refugees” from the Sudan in the 1990s.

Elsheikh was one of four nonwhite invaders in Britain who went off to join ISIS in Syria when that “caliphate” was at its height.

The group to which Elsheikh belonged (named as Alexandar Kotey, Aine Davis, and Mohammed Emwazi) was nicknamed the “Beatles” by the media because of their British accents.

Emwazi was born Muhammad Jassim Abdulkarim Olayan al-Dhafiri in Kuwait, and moved to Britain as a six-year-old with his family in 1994. He was dubbed “jihad John” and was the most famous of the group, doing the speaking on the numerous decapitation videos they produced.

Emwazi was killed in an air strike in November 2015.

Davis—the mixed race grandson of Jamaican trombonist in the 1980s UK “Ska” band, The Specials—was arrested in Turkey while planning a new attack and sentenced to seven-and-a-half years’ jail for membership of terrorist organization in May 2017.

In 2014 Davis’s wife, Amal El-Wahabi, 27, became the first woman in the UK to be jailed for terrorism offences connected to Syria after she was caught paying a smuggler to take €20,000 in cash to Turkey for her husband.

Kotey is also of mixed-race origin—Ghanaian and Greek-Cypriot—and he, along with Elsheikh, were arrested by Kurdish fighters in the east of Syria at the beginning of 2018.

The two were identified and handed over to American Special Operations forces, who confirmed their identities using fingerprints and other biometric measurements.

Together, the four nonwhites—all of who were initially based in London—beheaded atr least 27 hostages and tortured many more.

It is still not clear what is going to Kotey and Elsheikh. They could be put on trial in the US for killing American hostages, or they could be returned to the UK for trial.

Some reports have said that the two have had their UK citizenship stripped—something that is only possible if they have been naturalized as British nationals, and have citizenship of another nation.

No matter what their eventual fate, one thing is clear: the open borders “asylum” policy and the promotion of mass Third World immigration by successive UK governments has proven to be a disaster, and may yet destroy Britain forever.

Beheading of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians in Libya by ISIL functionaries.

“UN: ISIL holds several thousand blank passports”

NKWorld, 9 Feb 2018:

The United Nations has warned that fighters belonging to the Islamic State militant group may be using blank Syrian passports to cross borders.

The UN Security Council on Thursday released a report prepared by experts on the militant group and other terrorist organizations. It is based on information collected from local UN staff and governments of member states.

The report says the group has collected travel and identification documents from fighters coming from outside Syria and Iraq for potential use in travel. It also says the group has thousands of blank Syrian passports. It adds that they may be used by fighters seeking to return home or relocate.

Croatian Tomislav Salopek in 2016

The report also says the group continues to try to maintain and expand its influence despite recent setbacks in Iraq and Syria. It says the group is sending fighters and weapons to Libya and Somalia.

It also notes that the group obtains funds through systematic human trafficking.

The report says the group commands between 1,000 and 4,000 fighters in Afghanistan, including Afghan defectors from the Taliban as well as militant Islamist groups in Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

It warns that the Islamic State group continues to pose a significant and evolving threat around the world.

Arrow points to Millenial Filipino ISIL recruit

The Russian Federation is still crying: “Nobody likes traitors. Apparently, Kurds will stay alone with Turkish armed forces. Neither Damascus nor Moscow will provide any assistance to them. And only Kurdish leaders are responsible for that” - Alexandr Dugin.

It is a good sign that they are, along with their People’s Protection Unit (YPJ), putting imperialist Turkey, US, Russia and Israel in a bind.

Having their origin in separation from the Jewy treachery of Soviet Russia, its imperialism, its Muslim Turkish cohorts, in favor of left nationalism in order to wrest national independence for the Kurds, it would be ideal if this Asian backed left nationalism could sheer off the eastern half of Turkey and, along with fellow ethnonationalists from the west, put the squeeze on those rats. The imperial Russian Federation is still crying that the Kurds have rejected them. In causing consternation for the JewSA, Russovitz and Israel’s Turkish Friends, they are causing ethnonational consternation for imperial Israel as well.

Now, the Kurds have different facets and we are talking favorably about the ideal form and purpose of their left nationalism, not any assistance or alignment that some of them may have provided for radical Islam - on the contrary, that is just another form of imperialism.

Jerusalem Post, “Turkish and Syrian threats in Afrin put U.S., Russia in a bind, 19 January 2018:

What does it all mean for Israel?

People hold flags of People’s Protection Unit (YPJ) as they walk during a protest against Turkish attacks on Afrin, in Hasaka, Syria, January 18, 2018. . (photo credit: RODI SAID / REUTERS)

On Friday, Turkey increased its shelling of the Kurdish-held Afrin enclave in northern Syria. According to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) up to 70 artillery shells were fired during the night.

While Turkey has threatened to invade the Kurdish area, which it says is being controlled by terrorists aligned with the Kurdistan Workers Party, Syria has threatened to shoot down Turkish warplanes in case of any attack on Syria’s territory. The war of words in northern Syria puts the US and Russia in a bind because the US is allied with the Kurds in eastern Syria while Russia has been a close ally of the Syrian regime.

Since mid-January, there have been rumors and threats of a Turkish invasion of Afrin. The area has been controlled by the YPG since the early years of the Syrian civil war. In eastern Syria, the YPG and its affiliated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have been successful at defeating Islamic State. However, in northern Syria, the Kurds have only come to control the thinly populated mountainous area of Afrin.

The autonomous canton is home to around one million people. The area is surrounded by Turkey on two sides and in Syria it borders areas controlled by Syrian rebel groups. The Kurds in this area have remained mostly outside the Syrian conflict because the Syrian rebel groups represent a buffer from most of the heavy fighting.

However, the Kurds here also have a complex relationship with the Syrian regime. They have not opposed Russian military personnel, for instance, who have been spotted in the Afrin area, and the YPG maintains amicable contact with the Russians, who are the Syrian regime’s closet ally.

Since the fall of 2016, when Turkey began to intervene in Syria, the YPG has been targeted by the Turks and their Syrian rebel allies. When Turkey and those allies moved into the area between Jarabulus and Kilis in 2016, it was widely seen as an offensive not only against ISIS, but also to make sure the Kurdish forces did not get any closer to the Turkish border to link up Afrin with the areas they control in eastern Syria.

In March 2017, the US, which has been working closely with the SDF and YPG against ISIS, sent vehicles to Manbij to ward off any Turkish attack on its Kurdish partners. This was an important symbol because it showed the US had drawn a clear line around its partner forces and would warn off any attack. The US shot down a Syrian plane in June 2017 that was operating close to the SDF as well.

However, US-led coalition spokesman Ryan Dillon put out a statement on January 16 saying it is not operating in Afrin and the Pentagon told the Turkish news agency Anadolu that it was not involved with the YPG in Afrin. “We don’t consider them as part of our defeat ISIS operations,” a Pentagon spokesman said. This is a clear message to Turkey that the US would not be involved in any sort of operations if they happened in Afrin.

However, the US has indicated the US will be remaining in eastern Syria for the foreseeable future. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson reiterated this pledge Wednesday. The US has often urged Turkey to keep its focus on fighting ISIS, rather than mission creep that would lead to conflict with the Kurds. Any conflict with the Kurds would inevitably complicate the US mission in eastern Syria, because it would cause the Kurds in the east to want to aid their comrades in Afrin.

Turkey has posited that any operation into Afrin would be with rebel groups and that the operation is carried out “for them,” and Turkey is “helping our brothers,” according to statements from the Turkish Presidency. However, this poses problems because the Syrian rebels that Turkey wants to work with against Afrin are busy fighting the Syrian regime in Idlib, where they are hardpressed, suffering civilian and military loses.

Nevertheless Turkey’s defense minister Nurettin Canikli vowed on January 19 that Ankara would carry out the operation, according to Turkish media. “The threat level against Turkey is increasing by the day. This operation will be carried out and we will combat terrorism.” At the same time, the Syrian regime warns that any incursion could bring Syrian air defense into the picture. Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Daisal Mekdad warned Friday that any attack on Afrin would be an act of “aggression” against Syria.

According to Al-Jazeera, Russia has moved military observers in Afrin “away” from the area, closer to Syrian regime-held territory. Any attack would therefore not harm the Russians who have become a key arbiter of issues in Syria. Russia has hosted the Astana and Sochi talks about the future of Syria, meeting with Turkey, Iran and Syria’s governments. In Afrin, Russia is the key player because it has relations with all sides and it has warmed relations with Turkey over the last six months.

However, Russia has remained mum on any potential Turkish operation. It must balance its interests in cultivating relations with Syria, with its support of Damascus and its relations with the Kurds. Wishing to see itself as the broker of peace, Russia would hope that there is not a major Turkish incursion. That means any Turkish action might be limited, as it has been before, and the war of words is intended more to test the waters with the US, Russia and Syria, than lead to a major attack jeopardizing the lives of thousands.

For Israel, what does this mean? A similar scenario will eventually play out near the Golan, without Turkey but with the regime seeking to test the US, Jordan and Israel’s resolve with Russia in the background. Afrin therefore matters greatly to the region and what transpires there will tell us about the future of Syria.

READ MORE...

New Observer, “Egyptian ‘Migrant’ Terror Attack in Pennsylvania”, 25 Dec 2017:

An Egyptian legal immigrant who entered the US on a “chain migrant” visa carried out the triple terrorist attack on police in the Pennsylvanian state capital Harrisburg this week—an attack largely deliberately ignored the by controlled media.

According to a statement issued by the Department of Homeland Security, “the suspect involved in a terror attack in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and another suspect arrested on terror-related money laundering charges were both beneficiaries of extended family chain migration.”

The invader, named as Ahmed Amin El-Mofty, was a naturalized U.S. citizen who was admitted to the United States from Egypt on a family-based immigrant visa.

El-Mofty was killed on Friday December 22 in a shootout after opening fire and targeting police at multiple locations in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

The Egyptian invader started his attack at the 100 block of State Street, when Ahmed El-Mofty started firing gunshots. He then got into a vehicle and headed off towards the State Capitol Building, rounded a corner and shot several times at a Capitol Police car near Third and Walnut streets.

One shot came “very close” to hitting the officer driving, but he was able to escape without injury, according to Dauphin County District Attorney Ed Marsico.

About 30 minutes later, El-Mofty fired several shots at a Pennsylvania State Police trooper. The officer suffered minor injuries and was chased by the shooter more than a mile to Allison Hill near the intersection of 17th and Mulberry streets. By then more officers had converged on scene and killed El-Mofty in the resulting shootout.

“The long chain of migration that led to the suspect’s admission into the United States was initiated years ago by a distant relative of the suspect. One of the most recent links in that chain was an extended family member admitted into the United States from Egypt on an F24 visa,” the DHS statement said.

“Separately, Zoobia Shahnaz, who has been charged with laundering bitcoins to support ISIS, is a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to the United States from Pakistan on an F43 visa.

“The F43 visa is available to the children of F41 visa holders who were sponsored by other family members that obtained citizenship.”

Shwe Eain Si, maintains vigilance on Islamic imposition, atrocities.

India Today reports on the forced conversion to Islam of Rakhine Hindus in the Bangladesh refugee camps and the discovery of Hindu mass graves in Rakhine by the Myanmar security services. This report dates from September and has gone unnoticed in the West. I found it as the latest entry on the Facebook account of Shwe Eain Si, so the girl obviously hasn’t given up the fight. Good for her.

                    - Mancinblack