HOME
*



picture info

Rif Dimashq Offensive (February–April 2018)
The Rif Dimashq offensive (February–April 2018), code-named Operation Damascus Steel, was a military offensive launched by the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) in February 2018 in a bid to capture the rebel-held eastern Ghouta suburb during the Syrian Civil War. East Ghouta, a pocket of towns and farms, had been under government siege since 2013 and had been a major rebel stronghold in the vicinity of the capital of Damascus. According to the United Nations, nearly 400,000 people live in East Ghouta. On 14 April, the Syrian Army fully captured the Eastern Ghouta pocket. Before the offensive had concluded, the Associated Press reported that the capture of the whole rebel-held Eastern Ghouta enclave would represent one of the most significant victories for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the civil war, and the worst setback for the rebels since their defeat in the Battle of Aleppo in late 2016. Similarly, Reuters stated the capture of Eastern Ghouta would represent the biggest prize f ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Rif Dimashq Governorate Campaign
Part of the Syrian Civil War, the Rif Dimashq Governorate campaign consisted of several battles and offensives across the governorate including the Syrian capital of Damascus: Offensives *Rif Dimashq clashes (November 2011–March 2012): Damascus centre under government control, protests largely suppressed in the city. *Battle of Damascus (2012): rebels first infiltration of Damascus from the surrounding countryside. *Rif Dimashq offensive (August–October 2012): Syrian Army seizes more than half a dozen rebel-held towns north, west and south of Damascus, rebels retain control of the Ghouta area, east of Damascus. *Rif Dimashq offensive (November 2012–February 2013): Free Syrian Army takes control of Darayya, Zamalka, Harasta and Arbin, offensive stalls in early January 2013, due to continuing air-strikes. Army launches a major offensive on rebel-held Darayya in mid-January. * Siege of Darayya and Muadamiyat (November 2012–October 2016): rebels surrender Darayya as well a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Kata'ib Hezbollah
Kata'ib Hezbollah ( ar, كتائب حزب الله, lit=Battalions of the Party of God)—or the Hezbollah Battalions—is a radical Iraqi Shiite paramilitary group which is part of the Popular Mobilization Forces backed by Iran. During the Iraq War (2003–11), the group fought against Coalition forces. It has been active in the War in Iraq (2013–2017) and the Syrian civil war (2011–present). The group was commanded by Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis until he was killed by a US drone strike in Baghdad on 3 January 2020. Thereafter, he was replaced by Abdul Aziz al-Muhammadawi (Abu Fadak), as the new leader of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). Kata'ib Hezbollah is officially listed as a terrorist organization by the governments of Japan, United Arab Emirates, and the United States. History Formation Kata'ib Hezbollah (KH) was founded in 2003, shortly before the Iraq War that began in 2003 with the invasion of Iraq by the US and UK that overthrew the regime of Saddam Husse ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Republican Guard (Syria)
The Syrian Republican Guard ( ar, الْحَرَسُ الْجُمْهُورِيُّ, ''al-Ḥaras al-Jumhūriyy''), also known as the Presidential Guard, is an elite 25,000 man mechanized division, although it may actually approach corps size with around 60,000 guardsman. Its main purpose is to protect the capital, Damascus, from any foreign or domestic threats. The Guard was the only Syrian military unit allowed within the capital city before the civil war. History The Guard was formed in 1976 after the after the Syrian occupation of Lebanon to protect the increasingly unpopular president. Major-General Adnan Makhlouf commanded the Guard from 1976 until 1997. The Republican Guard is used mostly to protect top Syrian government officials from any external threats and to serve as a counter-weight to the other powerful Syrian Army formations near the capital, the 4th Mechanized Division, the 3rd Armoured Division, and the 14th Special Forces (Airborne) Division. Many members of t ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Syrian Republican Guard Symbol
Syrians ( ar, سُورِيُّون, ''Sūriyyīn'') are an Eastern Mediterranean ethnic group indigenous to the Levant. They share common Levantine Semitic roots. The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend of both indigenous elements and the foreign cultures that have come to inhabit the region of Syria over the course of thousands of years. The mother tongue of most Syrians is Levantine Arabic, which came to replace the former mother tongue, Aramaic, following the Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century. The conquest led to the establishment of the Caliphate under successive Arab dynasties, who, during the period of the later Abbasid Caliphate, promoted the use of the Arabic language. A minority of Syrians have retained Aramaic which is still spoken in its Eastern and Western dialects. In 2018, the Syrian Arab Republic had an estimated population of 19.5 million, which includes, aside from the aforementioned majority, ethnic minorities such as ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Syrian Army
" (''Guardians of the Homeland'') , colors = * Service uniform: Khaki, Olive * Combat uniform: Green, Black, Khaki , anniversaries = August 1st , equipment = , equipment_label = , battles = 1948 Arab–Israeli War Six-Day War War of Attrition Black September Yom Kippur War Lebanese Civil War 1982 Lebanon War Islamist uprising in Syria Mountain War (Lebanon) Operation Desert Storm Syrian Civil War , decorations = , battle_honours = , battle_honours_label = , disbanded = , website = , commander1 = Marshal Bashar al-Assad , commander1_label =President of Syria , commander2 = Gen. Ali Mahmoud Abbas , commander2_label = Minister of Defense , commander3 = Gen. Abdul Karim Mahmoud Ibrahim , commander3_label = Chief of the General Staff , notable_commanders = , identification_symbol = , identification_symbol_label = , identification_symbol_2 = , identification_symbol_2_label = The Syrian Army, officially the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) ( a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Enab Baladi
''Enab Baladi'' ( ar, عنب بلدي, lit=Country Grapes) is a Syrian nonprofit media organization that publishes a newspaper with the same name, in Arabic and English. It was established in Darayya, Syria in 2011, and is also a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. History and profile ''Enab Baladi'' newspaper was first launched in 2011 by a group of citizen journalists and activists from Daraya, a Syrian town in Damascus suburbs. On January 29, 2012, issue #0 was published marking the beginning of a revolutionary newspaper. Since then, it has been printed each week on Sundays, with one two-week stoppage in August 2012 due to the Darayya massacre The Darayya massacre ( ar, مجزرة داريا) was a massacre carried out by Syrian government forces of Bashar al-Assad that occurred between 20 and 25 August 2012 in the town of Darayya in the Rif Dimashq Governorate, Rif Dimashq province ... committed by Assad forces. ''Enab Baladi''s mission is to serve a role in educating Syr ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Essam Al-Buwaydhani
Essam al-Buwaydhani was a Syrian rebel leader. He was reportedly born in Douma and was a businessman by profession. He was elected leader of Jaysh al-Islam after Zahran Alloush, the previous leader of the group, was killed in a Syrian Air Force air strike An airstrike, air strike or air raid is an offensive operation carried out by aircraft. Air strikes are delivered from aircraft such as blimps, balloons, fighters, heavy bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters and drones. The offic ... in December 2015. References {{DEFAULTSORT:Buwaydhani, Essam 1971 births Syrian Salafis People of the Syrian civil war People from Rif Dimashq Governorate Syrian businesspeople 2019 deaths ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Al-Masdar News
''Al-Masdar News'' (sometimes abbreviated ''AMN'') ( ar, المصدر نيوز) is an online newspaper founded by Leith Abou Fadel. Al-Masdar is Arabic for "the source". ''Al-Masdar''s coverage focuses largely on conflict zones in the Middle East: Syria, Yemen, and Iraq. ''Al-Masdar'' has been described as being favorable to President Bashar al-Assad during its coverage of the Syrian civil war. Background ''Al-Masdar News'' (AMN) was launched in August 2014 as a media service that provides frontline news and analysis from the Middle East. Position The website was described by the BBC and ''Newsweek'' as having a pro-Syrian government viewpoint, while ''The Independent'' describes it as "sympathetic to the Syrian regime". ''The New York Times'' has described it as a "pro-government website". Leonid Bertshidsky writing in Bloomberg News, also calls ''Al-Masdar'' "somewhat pro-Assad." ''The National Interest'' describes it as "pro-Assad". ''The Jerusalem Post'' describes it as " ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Suheil Al-Hassan
Suheil Salman al-Hassan ( ar, سُهَيْلُ سَلْمَانَ الْحَسَنِ, Suhayl Salmān al-Ḥasan) (born 10 June 1970), nicknamed The Tiger, is a Brigadier General in the Syrian Army, currently serving as commander of its elite Tiger Forces. He graduated from the Syrian Arab Air Force academy in 1991, and served in many units of the Syrian Arab Air Forces and Air Defence Command, completing several training courses. After serving in the Syrian Arab Air Force and Syrian Arab Air Defence units, he joined the Air Force Intelligence service, where he was responsible for the training of the elements of the Special Operations Section. During the Syrian civil war, Suheil al-Hassan has served and commanded his troops during several major engagements, including Operation Canopus Star and the battle for the Shaer gas field. He is part of the new generation of field Syrian army commanders who emerged during the civil war. French newspaper ''Le Monde'' has claimed he could ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham
Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) (, transliteration: ', "Organization for the Liberation of the Levant" or "Levant Liberation Committee"), commonly referred to as Tahrir al-Sham, is a Sunni Islamist political and armed organisation involved in the Syrian Civil War. It was formed on 28 January 2017 as a merger between Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (formerly al-Nusra Front), the Ansar al-Din Front, Jaysh al-Sunna, Liwa al-Haqq, and the Nour al-Din al-Zenki Movement. During the foundation declaration, then-Emir Abu Jaber Shaykh described the Levant Liberation Committe "an independent entity" free from all the previous relations and allegiances as a result of the newly formed union, thereby disassociating itself from factions such as the Al-Nusra Front. Proclaiming the nascent organisation as "a new stage in the life of the blessed revolution”, Abu Jaber called upon all factions of the Syrian opposition to unite under its Islamic leadership and wage a "popular Jihad" to achieve the objective ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Ahrar Al-Sham
Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyya ( ar-at, حركة أحرار الشام الإسلامية, Ḥarakat Aḥrāru š-Šām al-Islāmiyah, lit=Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant), commonly referred to as Ahrar al-Sham, is a coalition of multiple Islamist and Salafist units that coalesced into a single brigade and later a division in order to fight against the Syrian Government led by Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian Civil War. Ahrar al-Sham was led by Hassan Aboud until his death in 2014. In July 2013, Ahrar al-Sham had 10,000 to 20,000 fighters, which at the time made it the second most powerful unit fighting against al-Assad, after the Free Syrian Army. It was the principal organization operating under the umbrella of the Syrian Islamic Front and was a major component of the Islamic Front. With an estimated 20,000 fighters in 2015, Ahrar al-Sham became the largest rebel group in Syria after the Free Syrian Army became less powerful. Ahrar al-Sham and Jaysh al ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Al-Rahman Legion
The al-Rahman Legion ( ar, فيلق الرحمن, ''Faylaq al-Raḥmān'') is a Syrian rebel group that operated in Eastern Ghouta, in the outskirts of Damascus, and in the eastern Qalamoun Mountains. It was the main rebel group in Jobar, and was backed by Qatar. The group's leader is Abdul al-Nasr Shamir, a captain from rural Homs who defected from the Syrian Army in early 2012. The Legion has been described as an " Islamist" or as a non-jihadi/non- Salafi "political Islamist"Jennifer Cafarella and Genevieve Casagrande, Syrian Armed Opposition Powerbrokers', Middle East Security Report 29, March 2016, Institute for the Study of War organisation. It describes itself as "a revolutionary military entity aiming for the downfall of the Syrian regime," but does not seek to turn Syria into an Islamic state. In 2016, it was described as "one of the oldest standing opposition factions in Damascus and maintains high levels of local legitimacy and support." Under a surrender agreement, ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]