Islamic State extends gains in parts of Syria: monitor
Residents watch militant
Islamist fighters taking part in a military parade along the streets of
Syria's northern Raqqa province
(Stringer . Reuters,, REUTERS / July 4, 2014)
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BEIRUT (Reuters) - Around 30 Islamic State fighters broke out of a makeshift jail where rival Syrian Islamists had been holding them, a monitoring group said on Friday as it detailed the latest territorial gains by the al Qaeda offshoot.
The insurgents demolished a wall to escape the building - a former school - after fellow Islamic State fighters took control of al-Hawaaj village where al Qaeda loyalists had been holding them, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
In the same province on Thursday, Islamic State seized control of Syria's largest oil field from the Nusra Front, al Qaeda's official wing in Syria, consolidating its position in the eastern Deir al-Zor province bordering Iraq.
Islamic State, which has declared a caliphate in parts of Syria and Iraq, includes thousands of foreign fighters and has become the main recruiting magnet for jihadi volunteers from Europe and North Africa. The Observatory said the 30 fighters that escaped on Friday were all Syrian.
The group is now considered the most potent insurgent band in Syria and its rivals complain that it spends more time fighting them than Syrian army forces.
It also captured the villages of Quniya and Buqris in the Deir al-Zor province from Nusra late on Thursday, the Observatory said. The villages are close to the town of Mayadin, which Islamic State seized earlier in the day.
The Observatory, an anti-Assad group which tracks the violence, said the Islamic State, previously called the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), now controls an area of Syria five times the size of neighboring Lebanon.
In Deir al-Zor province, only the regional capital and airport - still held by Syrian government forces - and a few villages remain outside Islamic State's control.
In the north, the group took the village of Zor Maghar, close to the Kurdish city of Ain al-Arab, after three days of fighting with Kurdish forces, the Observatory said.
Ain al-Arab, known as "Kobani" in Kurdish, is in Syria's Aleppo province, strategically placed on the border with Turkey.
(Reporting by Sylvia Westall; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
end quote from:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-rt-us-syria-crisis-20140704,0,7906848.story
You will notice that in this article the author is calling this "The Islamic State", so I guess the "Islamic State" has now reached the state of being of being a little like "North Korea" in that it must be recognized that it exists a lot like Nazi Germany had to be recognized because it was killing 6 million jews and destroying europe in the 1930s and 1940s.
Unfortunately, I think "The Islamic state" is just getting started, either as a nation or just as a terrorist group this group, ISIL likely will be around in some form for years and years to come. This is 100s of times more dangerous than Osama Bin Laden ever was to the Middle East and to the whole world.
And as more and more oil supplies are cut off around the world nations will have no choice but to get involved in this war caused by Russia and Iran starting in Syria.
also, Ain al-Arab is on the Turkish Border with Syria just north of the Euphrates River. I have noticed that one of the reasons ISIL has been successful is that they control everything on the Euphrates River from Turkey down almost to Baghdad. This control of the water all along this path likely allows them to extort large sums of money from everyone if they want any water at all which may be one of the many ways the ISIL (government?) is being supported militarily. I also watched videos of Shia and Sunni Mosques being blown up that ISIL controls north of Baghdad. Basically, any mosque that doesn't conform to extremist ISIL standards Shia or Sunni is now being blown up north of Baghdad and any Shia that doesn't swear allegiance to ISIL is being killed at this point north of Baghdad.
This is likely the worst example of ethnic cleansing even surmounting the Balkans war in the 1990s at this point. This will set Shia Sunni relations back 100 years or more in how they relate to each other for years and years to come. I pity any Shias or Sunnis that are married to each other because it becomes much more likely that one of them will be killed in the coming years unless they leave the middle east entirely.
also, Ain al-Arab is on the Turkish Border with Syria just north of the Euphrates River. I have noticed that one of the reasons ISIL has been successful is that they control everything on the Euphrates River from Turkey down almost to Baghdad. This control of the water all along this path likely allows them to extort large sums of money from everyone if they want any water at all which may be one of the many ways the ISIL (government?) is being supported militarily. I also watched videos of Shia and Sunni Mosques being blown up that ISIL controls north of Baghdad. Basically, any mosque that doesn't conform to extremist ISIL standards Shia or Sunni is now being blown up north of Baghdad and any Shia that doesn't swear allegiance to ISIL is being killed at this point north of Baghdad.
This is likely the worst example of ethnic cleansing even surmounting the Balkans war in the 1990s at this point. This will set Shia Sunni relations back 100 years or more in how they relate to each other for years and years to come. I pity any Shias or Sunnis that are married to each other because it becomes much more likely that one of them will be killed in the coming years unless they leave the middle east entirely.
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