By Vanessa Beeley
21st CenturySource: Wire.Com
After ten days of peace, mortars have returned to Damascus. A brief respite of around ten days of peace and security has been broken by the remaining Jaish Al Islam factions still embedded in Douma, the final pocket of Eastern Ghouta still under their control.

Yesterday the foreign media teams were taken to Eastern Ghouta, accompanied by the Syrian Arab Army for our own security due to the risk of mines, IEDs, booby traps and potential for suicide bombings etc. As we tried to enter Mleha we were told of a suicide car bombing in Barzeh about 15km away and to the north-west of our position. We were held for a few minutes and then advised to turn back. Soldiers passed us in pick-up trucks, heading towards Mleha, and we could see smoke rising further down the road, gunfire rattled sporadically in the distance.

The same day four civilians were killed in Damascus, among them a child and a woman. Twenty-two others were injured in the Jaish Al Islam attacks on the city centre that targeted Al Rabweh, Masaken, Barzeh, Al Mezzeh 86 neighbourhood and the surroundings of Umayyad Square. On a Friday it is a Damascene tradition for families to head to Al Rabweh for lunch and to spend the evening on the banks of the river in one of the colourful restaurants that line the roadside. This was deliberate targeting of busy civilian areas by Jaish Al Islam factions, backed by Saudi Arabia and hostile Gulf States.

Last night the roar of jets overhead returned and the boom of Syrian Arab Army artillery echoed around the narrow cobbled streets of the Old City shaking the already fragile windows as people poured on to the streets for the start of the Orthodox Easter.

Early this morning I heard the return fire from Jaish Al Islam militants again targeting the civilian areas of Damascus. 7 mortar shells have hit Al Mezzeh 86 neighbourhood, the surroundings of Umayyad Square close by, Abu Remmaneh and Ish al Warwar areas. The inevitable material damage to houses, cars and public infrastructure has also resulted from these indiscriminate attacks.

The general director of Al Mowasat hospital in Damascus has announced that there are six dead already today, 38 injured and ten in critical condition. The following video just published by the Syrian Arab News Agency shows horrifying scenes from these deadly attacks across the city.

Yesterday, I had picked up the following statement from the Russian reconciliation centre:

“In accordance with the Russian Center for Reconciliation information on the 6th of April the shelling of Damascus and position of Government troops has been renewed. Mortar shelling and small arms firing are conducted by Jaysh al-Islam fighters leaded by Abu Qusay, who seized the power. Leaders of the group interrupted the evacuation of fighters and their family members and demanded to review previously agreed issues regarding the group disarmament.

Abu Qusay decided to use civilians as a human shield. With the aim to frighten population they executed civilians protesting against fighters staying in the area. Terrorists as well started preparing for execution of hostages. There are about 5 000 people, including women and children, in 2 JAI’s prisons.”

It was clear yesterday that the new leadership of Jaish Al Islam are digging in and will cause maximum damage to Damascus and its citizens before being militarily defeated or eventually evacuated.

Today on Twitter – Syrian/UK journalist Danny Makki published the following updates. The numbered points are taken directly from Makki’s Twitter thread.:

1: Yesterday the Russian negotiator & Jaysh al Islam agreed on several points & a deal was made pending final confirmation which would see weapons handed over, some militants taken to Jarablus and others to stay.

2: Then when the meeting occurred (yesterday) to formalize the arrangement’s Jaysh al-Islam withdrew from some of the agreed points & were given a time-frame to respond to.

3: Jaysh al Islam changed their negotiator for the meeting replacing Abo Ammar Dalwan (Head of JAI’s political office) to Abo Qusay al-Deirani assistant to the head of JAI & security official.

4: One of the reasons for JAI’s withdrawal from the negotiations at end of the meeting was due to issues over giving over heavy weapons, preferring to only give it over till a wider political solution is made, in Syria in terms of those wanting to stay in Douma.

5: The idea was those whose wanting to stay could stay and become an auxiliary force to the SAA fighting Nusra & ISIS or guarding Douma as a local police force.

6: Those who wanted to leave would be taken to Jarablus in Aleppo which is held by Turkish backed Euphrates Shield.

7: The agreement was that JAI gives over its heavy weapons only at the start of the process and the SAA withdraws its heavy weapons from around Douma in a de-escalation phase.

8: JAI asked the Russians If they could guarantee whether the SAA would withdraw their heavy weapons to which the Russians replied we can guarantee that warplanes won’t be used & some heavy weapons would be withdrawn accordingly.

9: Heavy weapons would be handed over to SAA with Russian military police observing the whole process over a period of three days.

10: Then over a period of 1 week, JAI handover its light and medium weapons, and the SAA withdraws its fighting units from the area.

11: Those who hand over their weapons can enter a reconciliation agreement & apply for joining the police force over a 2 week period and thus guard their area with Russia being the guarantor.

12: A fighting brigade of JAI remnants would also be created allowing those to fight alongside SAA against extremist groups elsewhere.

13: The new brigade & Police force made up of JAI remnants are given weapons and support by the Russians.

14: Russian military police was meant to be present at the checkpoints and the area to guarantee all of this.

15: After weapons are handed over to SAA, a committee from the Damascus C.S governorate comes into Douma and attempts to solve all of the issues the city is suffering from – services – water etc.

16: All civilians set to return to their homes, those in Douma facing military service would be given a temporary amnesty.

17: SAA and security forces won’t enter the city, then the pro government captives get handed back over to the SAA through the Russians.

18: Russians left meeting stating that they are awaiting a written response from JAI by 8.00 PM affirming that the handing over of weapons is compulsory for any deal to continue.

19: After that the negotiations stopped and a response never came, and since the afternoon today all hell has been breaking loose in Douma with heavy fighting and shelling, in both Douma and Damascus.

It appears that the primary issue for Jaish Al Islam is quite simply – nobody wants them, they are the pariahs of the terrorist community inside Syria. The only option open to them for evacuation is Jarablus. They will not be allowed to take their heavy armoury that has been accrued over years (if not decades) of smuggling & contraband activity financed largely by the absolute monarchy of Saudi Arabia, with Israel as the midwife during the birth of one of the most brutal & tyrannical of the terrorist groups inside Syria.

Their inherent barbarism is now coming to the fore with an unprecedented viciousness. They have executed civilians who stand against them to put pressure on the Syrian government, loss of human life is of no consequence to them. The conservative estimate of prisoners incarcerated in their “repentance” prisons is 3,500 but many have told me they fear there are many more. Their lives now hang in the balance.

Lives will be lost if the Syrian Arab Army intensify the military campaign against JAI now but lives are already being lost on a daily basis and freedom from terrorist occupation comes with a sickening and bloody price. Always it is the innocents who suffer.

The soldiers I have seen in Eastern Ghouta appear haunted by that choice, one that has been imposed upon them by external powers – NATO member states, Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia. These soldiers must witness the inevitable loss of life among their own people in order to free their own people who are being held hostage in urban areas by heavily armed extremist forces. That is not a choice, it is the horrific result of this regime change war that has driven an entire nation to make choices that defy all moral or ethical values. It is not a reflection of the Syrian Arab Army, nor of its allies – it is the reflection of those who are waging, financing & promoting this war for whom human life of any denomination is to be carelessly trodden underfoot in their rush towards their destructive objectives.

Jaish Al Islam have left the Russian reconciliation efforts and the Syrian government with very little negotiating room. They would reduce Syria to a “stone-age” nation of graveyards and they must be stopped. Violence begets violence in the minds of these backward extremists who see no way out of their self-imposed predicament and who will take all of Douma down with them if not stopped in their tracks. The imprisoned civilians must be liberated and Douma must be freed from this decaying carcass of violence being kept alive by the Saudi-backed warlords.

According to SANA, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) together with Tiger Forces continue to secure the exit of hundreds of civilians from terrorist held areas in Eastern Ghouta.

Last Saturday 24.04.2018, the towns of Saqba, Kafr Batna, and Hamouriyah were liberated. Syrian authorities immediately commenced attending health care needs and sending trucks with food supply to assist the immediate needs of the liberated population.

In addition, authorities also began an assessment of the damaged infrastructure to restore essential services and start reconstruction.

By Sunday a second batch of 81 buses begun the transfer of 5435 terrorists and their families from Jobar, Ein Tarma, Zamalka and Erbin to Idlib in north-west of Syria.

Last week 10 buses transferred 500 of Faylak Al-Rahman terrorists and their families from Harasta to Idlib. Some of the terrorists were released from prison, a deal that secured the release of 13 kidnapped Syrian soldiers. The SAA also secured the release of eight civilians who had been kidnapped and held hostage for over four years.

Also on Sunday, the Army secured another 1100 civilians, mainly women, children and elderly people, through Al-Wafideen safety corridor, while the Army took full control of Haza town.

Over 80% of Eastern Ghouta is now under Syrian Govt control. There were many moments of joy as liberated civilians reunited with family members outside East Ghouta. A SAA soldier shed torrents of tears as he reunited with his mother who he had not seen for seven years.

The City of Damascus is still in morning for the tens of civilians murdered by terrorists bombings last week. On Saturday evening another rocket hit the Faiha Sports Centre killing a young soccer player, Samir Massoud, an injuring at least six other.

The terrorist group Jaish al-Islam has decided to remain in Douma to continue terrorising and killing civilians, while in Afrin at least 170,000 civilians have been displaced by Turkey backed terrorists.

The SAA and Tiger Forces will continue their campaign of liberation of Eastern Ghouta and the rest of the country until every corner of Syria is free from terrorists and every imperial and neo-colonial invading force.

Source: SANA
The Syrian Arab Army has declared the entire Deir Ezzor city fully liberated after the last positions of ISIS in it were eliminated.

“Units of the Syrian Arab Army, in cooperation with the allied and supporting forces, have accomplished the mission of fully liberating Deir Ezzor city from ISIS terrorist organization,” a military source said on Friday.

Large numbers of ISIS terrorists, including leaders, were killed and their weapons and equipment were destroyed, the source affirmed, noting that the army units and supporting forces have seized ISIS munitions depots in the city.

After assuming full control of the city, the army’s engineering units embarked on sweeping the streets, roads, squares and buildings in the liberated neighborhoods to remove unexploded ordnance (bombs, mines and explosive devices) left behind by ISIS terrorists in the area.

The army’s new achievement came as a result of month-long special military operations against ISIS terrorists’ hotbeds that took into consideration protecting the citizens’ houses in the residential areas.

The full liberation of the eastern city of Deir Ezzor is an important step made by the Syrian Arab Army towards fully eliminating of ISIS from all the Syrian territory and foiling all the attempts of the US-led international coalition that are aimed at prolonging the existence of the terrorist organization to implement its anti –Syrian agenda.

Hama

An army unit established control over al-Shakosya village and the farms surrounding it in the northeastern countryside of Hama.

SANA reporter said that an army unit, in cooperation with allied forces, carried out intensive operation against the gatherings of Jabhat al-Nusra in al-Shakosya village which ended up with restoring security and stability to it.

A number of terrorists were killed during the operation while the rest of them fled away, leaving the bodies of their dead and their weapons and ammunition.

Source: Al Masdar News
The Islamic State (ISIL) is having a rough time this weekend as they continue to lose large swathes of territory to the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) across the country.

In particular, the Islamic State has found themselves in serious trouble in the central part of the country, thanks in large part to the Syrian Army’s airborne operation that was conducted last night in the Homs Governorate.

Syrian paratroopers landed 20km behind ISIL’s lines on Friday night, catching the terrorist group off-guard and forcing them to withdraw from the entire Al-Kadeer area near Al-Qawm.

As a result of this operation, the Syrian Arab Army’s units in the Homs Governorate have almost linked up with their forces in the Al-Raqqa Governorate town of Resafa.

Once the Syrian Army reaches the southern countryside of Al-Resafa, the Islamic State will be fully besieged in central Syria, as they will have no route to retreat from both east Hama and Homs.

By Ibrahim Joudeh
Source: Al-Masdar News
A Syrian Arab Army (SAA) military source has just announced the full liberation of al-Sukhnah town [North East Palmyra] in eastern Homs Governorate.

Last night, the Syrian Army and its allies entered the strategic town from its southern and southwestern axes. Amid heavy clashes with ISIS terrorists, pro-government forces managed to crush the last ISIS defense lines inside the city and advanced deep towards the northern districts before fully liberating it.

SAA ordinance disposal teams have started work on clearing al-Sukhnah of mines and improvised explosive devices (IED).

By this advance, the SAA is now 55 kilometers from the western Deir Ezzor provincial border and 110 kilometers away from the city of Deir Ezzor itself (via the al-Sukhnah axis).

By Sharmine Narwani
Source: The American Conservative
In July, the White House and Pentagon requested authority from Congress to build further “temporary intermediate staging facilities” inside Syria in order to combat ISIS more effectively. This request, it must be noted, comes in the wake of devastating ISIS defeats in Syria, mostly by the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and its allied forces.

Shortly afterward, the Turkish state-owned Anadolu news agency revealed previously unknown details and locations of ten U.S. bases and outposts in northern Syria, several of them with airfields. These are in addition to at least two further U.S. outposts already identified in southern Syria, on the Iraqi border.

When asked about these military bases, a CENTCOM (U.S. Central Command) spokesman told me: “We don’t have bases in Syria. We have soldiers throughout Syria providing training and assist to the SDF (the mainly Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces in the north of the country).” How many soldiers? “Roughly 1,200 troops,” says CENTCOM.

Yet when questioned about the international law grounds for this U.S. military presence inside Syria, CENTCOM didn’t have a response on hand. They referred me to the Office of the Secretary of Defense whose spokesman obstinately cited U.S. domestic law—an issue quite irrelevant to Syrians. He, in turn, referred me to the White House and State Department on the international-law angle. The State Department sent me back to the Department of Defense, the White House pointed me in the direction of the National Security Council (NSC), and the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel blankly ignored my repeated requests.

It isn’t hard to conclude that official Washington simply doesn’t want to answer the “international law” question on Syria. To be fair, in December 2016, the Obama administration offered up an assessment on the legalities of the use of force in Syria, but perhaps subsequent ground developments—the SAA and its allies defeating ISIS and Al Qaeda left, right, and center—have tightened some lips in the nation’s capital.

The map of U.S. bases in Syria is confusing. For starters, it reveals that many of the US outposts—or “staging facilities”—are nowhere near ISIS-controlled areas. This has generated some legitimate suspicion about U.S. motives in Syria, especially since American forces have begun to attack Syrian military targets with more frequency. This summer saw U.S. strikes against Syrian allied forces, drones, and a fighter jet all in the space of a few weeks. And most memorably, in September 2016, Coalition fighters killed over 100 SAA troops fighting ISIS in Deir Ezzor, paving the way for a brief ISIS takeover of strategic points in the oil-rich province.

It appears that U.S. intentions may go beyond the stated objective of fighting terrorism in Syria—and that Washington’s goals are also territorial and political and seek to retain post-conflict zones of influence within the country: in the south, north, and along the Syrian-Iraqi border.

Former Obama White House and NSC senior legal official Brian Egan believes the coming challenge for U.S. policymakers—in terms of international law—will be to justify clashes with Syrian forces and their allies.

“I think the harder international law question to defend is with respect to use of force against the [Syrian President Bashar] al-Assad regime,” warns Egan. “For example, the U.S. strike in response to the [alleged] chemical weapons attack. There’s no self-defense justification, there’s no UN Security Council resolution. It’s an open question what the U.S. depends on in terms of international law.”

“Theories that might be applicable against terrorist groups like ISIS don’t appear to apply for U.S. military ops against Syrian forces. The more that U.S. forces are in-theater in Syria, the greater the chance of conflict between the U.S. and Syrian forces, which makes it essential that [this administration] explains its justification for potential operations in Syria,” emphasizes Egan.

But it’s not only Syrian forces and military targets that have come under American fire. In a stream of letters to the UN Security Council this year, the Syrian government asserts U.S. air strikes have also “systematically” destroyed vital infrastructure and economic assets throughout the country for months, and complains that the attacks are “being carried out outside the framework of international legality.” The Syrians claim that these infrastructure targets include the Ghalban oil collection branch station, Umar oilfield, wells and facilities, electrical transformer stations, Tanak oil field and facilities, Izbah oil field and installations—all in Deir Ezzor governorate—a gas plant and bridges and structures of the Balikh Canal in Raqqa, buildings and facilities belonging to the General Establishment of Geology and Mineral Resources in Homs, Furat and Baath Dam facilities, the Euphrates Dam, the Tishrin Dam and their reservoirs, irrigation and power generation facilities, and many other vital sites across the country.

With U.S. legal arguments supporting military presence in Syria unravelling, the Pentagon’s untenable position has become noticeable, even within its own ranks.

“Here’s the conundrum,” explained U.S. Special Operations Command Chief Army General Raymond Thomas to an Aspen gathering last week, in response to a question about whether U.S. forces will stay in Syria, post-ISIS: “We are operating in the sovereign country of Syria. The Russians, their stalwarts, their back-stoppers, have already uninvited the Turks from Syria. We’re a bad day away from the Russians saying, ‘Why are you still in Syria, U.S.?’”

The Russians, Iranians, Hezbollah, and other allied Syrian forces are in Syria legally, at the invitation of the UN-recognized state authority. The United States and its coalition partners are not.

At the moment, the latter are trying hard to ignore that elephant in the room. But as ISIS collapses, the question “why are you still here?” is going to rise in volume.

When the U.S.-led coalition first launched overt military operations inside Syria in September 2014, various western governments cited both the recently-passed UNSC Resolution 2249 and Article 51 (Iraq’s invitation for “collective self-defense”) as their legal justification for doing so.

Neither of these justifications provided legal grounds for use of force in Syria, however. There are basically only three clear-cut international law justifications for use of force: a UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution providing Chapter 7 authority, self-defense against an act of aggression by a territorial state, and an invitation by the legitimate authority of a sovereign state for foreign troops to act within its borders—“consent of a territorial state.”

While UNSC Res. 2249 called upon member states to “take all necessary measures” against ISIS in Syria and Iraq, it explicitly stated that any such measures must be “in compliance with international law, in particular with the UN Charter”—which requires consent of a territorial state, in this case, the Syrian government.

And while Iraq did invite the Coalition to militarily engage ISIS within its territory, its “collective self-defense” argument does not justify the use of force inside Syrian territory—because Syria did not attack Iraq.

To make up for the gaping holes in its international-law arguments, the U.S.-led Coalition performed some legal acrobatics. The “unwilling and unable” theory posits that the Coalition could engage militarily in Syria because the legitimate government of Syria was either unable or unwilling (or both) to fight ISIS.

An onslaught of media articles and carefully-framed narratives were employed to set the scene for this theory. Recall, if you will, the slew of articles claiming that ISIS controlled around 50 percent of Syria—areas which were outside of Syrian state control—all meant to guide us to the conclusion that Syria was “unable” to fight ISIS. Or the narratives that insisted, until ground evidence proved otherwise, that the Syrian government aided ISIS, that it never fought the terror group, that it only targeted “moderate rebels”—all intended to persuade us that Syria was “unwilling” to target ISIS.

In fact, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and its allies have fought ISIS throughout this conflict, but were often distracted by more urgent battles against U.S., Turkish, British, French, Saudi, UAE and Qatari-backed Islamist militants in the western corridor of the country, where Syria’s main population and infrastructure hubs are located. ISIS-controlled territories, it should be noted, were mostly in the largely barren, sparsely populated and desert regions in the north-east and east of Syria.

The NATO-Gulf Cooperation Council strategy appears to ping-pong Syrian troops from east to west, north to south, wearing them down, cleverly diverting them from any battle in which they were making gains. And it was working, until the Russians stepped into the fray in September 2015 and sunk the Coalition’s “unwilling and unable” theory.

As Major Patrick Walsh, associate professor in the International and Operational Law Department at the US Army’s Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School in Virginia, wrote that October:

“The United States and others who are acting in collective defense of Iraq and Turkey are in a precarious position. The international community is calling on Russia to stop attacking rebel groups and start attacking ISIS. But if Russia does, and if the Assad government commits to preventing ISIS from attacking Syria’s neighbors and delivers on that commitment, then the unwilling or unable theory for intervention in Syria would no longer apply. Nations would be unable to legally intervene inside Syria against ISIS without the Assad government’s consent.”

The UK’s leading security and defense analyst firm IHT Markit observed in an April 2017 report that during the time period in which ISIS suffered its most crippling defeats, Syrian allied forces fought the terror group two and a half times as often as U.S.-backed ones. With the Russian air force providing Syrian allied troops with game-changing air cover, the battle against ISIS and other terror groups began to turn decisively in Syria’s favor. And, with that, out went even the “theoretical” justification for U.S. military intervention in Syria.

As ISIS and Al Qaeda are beaten back in Syria, the American conversation about what comes next is missing a most critical point. In terms of international law, Washington has gone rogue in Syria. Will the world take notice?

Sharmine Narwani is a commentator and analyst of Mideast geopolitics, based in Beirut.