Hezbollah Fighters Killed in Qalamoun Fighting. As the battle heats up in Qalamoun, a mountainous area near the Syria-Lebanon border, Beirut’s Daily Star reports that 19 Hezbollah fighters have died in Syria in the past 10 days.
They include the nephew of Lebanese Agriculture Minister Hussein Hajj Hasan.
“Besides Qalamoun, Hezbollah fighters are assisting troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in other areas across Syria, including the suburbs of Damascus, where fierce battles have been taking place over the past days,” the paper writes.
“In May, Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah announced that his group was fighting alongside the Syrian army to prevent the fall of the regime at the hands of Takfiri groups, the term Hezbollah and the Damascus regime use to refer to Syrian rebels.
“Lebanon has officially adopted a policy of disassociation from the civil war in its neighbor.”
Disillusionment Grows Among Syrian Opposition. Anne Barnard reports for the New York Times on the opposition’s growing frustration with itself, something she calls Assad’s greatest success to date.
“Khaled, 33, a former protester who fled Damascus after being tortured and fired from his bank post, quit his job in Turkey with the exile opposition, disillusioned and saying that he wished the uprising ‘had never happened,’” Barnard writes.
“In the Syrian city of Homs, a rebel fighter, Abu Firas, 30, recently put down the gun his wife had sold her jewelry to buy, disgusted with his commanders, who, he said, focus on enriching themselves. Now he finds himself trapped under government shelling, broke and hopeless.
“’The ones who fight now are from the side of the regime or the side of the thieves,’ he said in a recent interview via Skype. ‘I was stupid and naïve,’ he added. ‘We were all stupid.’”
The Brotherhood’s Vision for Syria. Tam Hussein of the Majallah, an Arabic magazine, interviews Ali Sadreddine al-Bayanouni, the former leader of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, about the role Islamist groups are playing on the ground during the war.
“Among other Islamist groups based in Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood has historically been the focus of the regime’s oppression. Most notably, a six-year-long uprising against the government of Hafez al-Assad, led by the Muslim Brotherhood, was brutally crushed in 1982 in the western city of Hama,” Hussein writes.
“Despite the brutality of the Syrian civil war, the Muslim Brotherhood has again become one of the main players on the ground, after years operating underground.”
Al-Bayanouni tells Hussein that the Brotherhood’s current position in Syria “is to help the people of Syria and all the brigades against the regime, irrespective of creed or ideology. But we do not accept Takfirists [those who deem other Muslims apostates], nor do we accept foreigners coming and enforcing their vision on the Syrian people.”
Suggested Reads from Our Editorial Team:
Daily Beast: The Little Syrian Girl With a Bullet in Her Head
Guardian: Zaatari Refugee Camp Manager Answers Readers’ Questions
Guardian: Syria’s Refugee Children Forced into Work by Poverty and Family Breakdown – Interactive
Telegraph: Behind the Smiles at School for Child Victims of Syria Conflict PBS NewsHour: Politics of Aid Inside Syria Increases Suffering for Those Displaced by War
Daily Star: Aid Funding Goes Missing in Northern Syria
Time.com: Tragedy by Numbers: The Lasting Impact of War on Syria’s Children
Jerusalem Post: Historically Unprecedented Number of European Muslim Fighters in Syria