|
Rebels Seize Arms Depot Near Damascus As Kurds, Jihadists Clash In Hasakeh
[AnNahar] Rebels battling Syrian  Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad Supressor of the Damascenes... 's regime captured an arms and ammunition dump in the Qalamun area near Damascus early on Saturday, a watchdog said. In the north, fighting between Kurds and jihadists raged as the main opposition National Coalition called on gangs there to "exercise restraint." The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said several groups, including the jihadist al-Nusra Front, were behind the capture of the depot of anti-tank weapons and rockets. "Liwa al-Islam, al-Nusra Front, al-Tawhid battalion, the Maghaweer (rebel commando force) and the Qalamun Martyrs' battalion... captured an ammunition depot near the village of Qaldun in the Qalamun area" northeast of the capital, the Britannia-based Observatory said. They seized "anti-tank weapons and ground-to-ground Grad missiles, as well as a variety of other ammunition, after festivities overnight from Friday to Saturday," it said. Meanwhile the state news agency SANA reported that the bullet-riddled bodies of local official Ahmed Marmar and two other men were found near the Qalamun hospital. Marmar was a member of the a local council and had been kidnapped last week along with the other two men from Qalamun, near the Lebanese border. Using the regime's term for rebels, SANA accused "snuffies of kidnapping the three men and shooting them dead." In Damascus itself, fighting was reported in the flashpoint southern belt, as loyalist forces pressed a months-long bid to dislodge rebels from the city's outskirts. Elsewhere, the army shelled rebel-held areas of the central city of Homs, focusing on the neighborhoods of Juret al-Shiyah and Qussour, said the Observatory. After the rebels lost the Khaldiyeh district this week, the army has pushed on with its bid to dislodge them completely from Syria's third city. In the northern province of Hasakeh, jihadists and Kurds clashed two weeks after the expulsion of radical Islamists from the strategic Kurdish town of Ras al-Ain, opening up a new front. Syria's main opposition group called on warring parties in the north to "exercise restraint... to ensure the safety of civilians and secure the release of detainees." Posted by: trailing wife 2013-08-04 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=373351 |