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Syrian Desert Campaign (May–July 2017)
The Syrian Desert campaign (May–July 2017) was a large-scale military operation of the Syrian Army that initially started along the highway from Damascus to the border with Iraq against rebel forces during the Syrian Civil War. Its first intended goal was to capture both the highway and the al-Tanf border crossing, thus securing the Damascus countryside from a potential rebel attack. Later, multiple other fronts were opened as part of the operation throughout the desert, as well as operation "Grand Dawn" against ISIL with the aim of reopening the Damascus-Palmyra highway and preparing for an offensive towards Deir ez-Zor. Since 2016, the United States and the United Kingdom operated and manned a training facility in al-Tanf (the "Al Tanf Garrison"), with their special operations troops advising a Syrian rebel group known as the Revolutionary Commando Army. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Al-Qa'im (town)
Al-Qa'im ( ar, القائم) is an Iraqi border town located nearly 400 km (248 mi) northwest of Baghdad near the Syrian border and situated along the Euphrates River, and located in the Al Anbar Governorate. It has a population of about 74,100 and it's the center of the Al-Qa'im District. The river water at Al-Qa'im carries less salt and mineral, so that it takes significantly less water to sustainably produce crops here than farther downstream, where more gallons of water must be used to avoid salinity. The Al-Qa'im border crossing connects Al-Qaim to close city Abu Kamal in Syria. Pre-war history In the early 20th century, there was a ''khan'' (caravanserai) and police station in Al-Qa'im, but no village. The ''khan'' was built in 1907 and was the residence of a local administrator. The surrounding area was inhabited by Arabs from the Karablah and Jara'if tribes. Al-Qa'im was reportedly the site of Iraq's refined uranium ore production from 1984 through 1990. The o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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] |
Al-Monitor
Al-Monitor ( ar, المونيتور) is a news website launched in February 2012 by the Arab American entrepreneur Jamal Daniel and based in Washington, DC, United States. Al-Monitor provides reporting and analysis from and about the Middle East. History and organization Al-Monitor was launched on 13 February 2012 by the Arab-American Jamal Daniel (who was born in Syria, but grew up in Lebanon). It was founded with the intention to publish a diverse set of perspectives on the region, bridging the gap of information available to both those in the Middle East and those elsewhere with a desire to better understand a rapidly changing region. In 2018, Al-Monitor partnered with North Base Media which was founded by Marcus Brauchli and Sasa Vucinic in managing Al-Monitor in order "to provide top-level operational and financial decision-making, and work with the company to explore possible content and commercial avenues." At its founding, the site also translated content from countries ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quds Force
The Quds Force ( fa, نیروی قدس, niru-ye qods, Jerusalem Force) is one of five branches of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) specializing in unconventional warfare and military intelligence operations. U.S. Army's Iraq War General Stanley McChrystal describes the Quds Force as an organization analogous to a combination of the CIA and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the United States. Responsible for extraterritorial operations, the Quds Force supports non-state actors in many countries, including Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Yemeni Houthis, and Shia militias in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. The Quds Force reports directly to the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei.Dionisi, 7 After Qassem Soleimani was killed, his deputy, Esmail Ghaani, replaced him. The U.S. Secretary of State designated the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Quds Force as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) in 2019 based on the IRGC's "continued ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Qasem Soleimani
Qasem Soleimani ( fa, قاسم سلیمانی, ; 11 March 19573January 2020) was an Iranian military officer who served in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). From 1998 until his assassination in 2020, he was the commander of the Quds Force, an IRGC division primarily responsible for extraterritorial and clandestine military operations. In his later years, he was considered by some analysts to be the right-hand man of the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, as well as the second-most powerful person in Iran behind him.U.S. killing of Iran's second most powerful man risks regional conflagration reuters.com As a civi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Syrian Army
The Free Syrian Army (FSA) ( ar, الجيش السوري الحر, al-jaysh as-Sūrī al-ḥur) is a loose faction in the Syrian Civil War founded on 29 July 2011 by officers of the Syrian Armed Forces with the goal of bringing down the government of Bashar al-Assad. (Pages 6, 14–17.) Initially a formal organization at its founding, its structure gradually dissipated by late 2012, and the FSA identity has since been used by various opposition groups. In late 2011, the FSA was considered the main Syrian military defectors group. It had success against far better equipped government forces. From July 2012 onward, the group was weakened by decreasing discipline, growing Inter-rebel conflict during the Syrian Civil War, infighting, and a lack of funding, while Syrian opposition#Other groups affiliated with Syrian opposition, Islamist groups became dominant within the armed opposition. The Free Syrian Army aims to be "the military wing of the Syrian people's opposition to the regi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liwa Fatemiyoun
Liwa Fatemiyoun ( ar, لِوَاء الْفَاطِمِيُّون, Liwā’ al-Fāṭimīyūn, Persian/Dari: or ), literally "Fatimid Banner", also known as Fatemiyoun Division or Fatemiyoun Brigade, is an Afghan Shia militia formed in 2014 to fight in Syria on the side of the Syrian government.The group's officially designated purpose, is the defense of the shrine of Zaynab bint Ali, and to fight "''takfiri terrorists''" in Syria, which would come to include the Islamic State (IS). It is funded, trained, and equipped by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and fights under the command of Iranian officers. Both the Fatemiyoun Brigade and the Iranian government downplay their relationship with one another, despite clear coordination and the brigade's operation under the auspices of the IRGC. Liwa Fatemiyoun is also closely associated with Hezbollah Afghanistan. By late 2017, the unit was presumed to have numbered between 10,000–20,000 fighters. According to Zohair Moj ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hezbollah
Hezbollah (; ar, حزب الله ', , also transliterated Hizbullah or Hizballah, among others) is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and militant group, led by its Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah since 1992. Hezbollah's paramilitary wing is the Jihad Council, and its political wing is the Loyalty to the Resistance Bloc party in the Lebanese Parliament. After the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, the idea of Hezbollah arose among Lebanese clerics who had studied in Najaf, and who adopted the model set out by Ayatollah Khomeini after the Iranian Revolution in 1979. After failing to agree on a name for the new organisation, the party's founders adopted the name chosen by Ayatollah Khomeini, Hezbollah. The organization was established as part of an Iranian effort, through funding and the dispatch of a core group of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (pasdaran) instructors, to aggregate a variety of Lebanese Shia groups into a unified organization to resist the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Popular Mobilization Forces
The Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) ( ar, الحشد الشعبي ''al-Ḥashd ash-Shaʿbī''), also known as the People's Mobilization Committee (PMC) and the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), is an Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...i state-sponsored umbrella organization composed of approximately 67 different armed factions, with around 128,000 fighters that are mostly Shia Muslim groups, but also include Sunni Islam in Iraq, Sunni Muslim, Christianity in Iraq, Christian, and Yazidis#Iraq, Yazidi groups. However, an investigation led by Former Prime Minister of Iraq, Haider al-Abadi revealed that approximately 60,000 are real soldiers, while the others 70,000 are "Ghost soldiers". The Popular Mobilization Units as a group was formed in 2014 and have fought ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Long War Journal
''FDD's Long War Journal'' (LWJ) is an American news website, also described as a blog, which reports on the War on terror. The site is operated by Public Multimedia Incorporated (PMI), a non-profit media organization established in 2007. PMI is run by Paul Hanusz and Bill Roggio. Roggio is the managing editor of the journal and Thomas Joscelyn is senior editor. The site is a project of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where both Roggio and Joscelyn are senior fellows. The journal evolved from Roggio's personal blog with which he reported on conflicts involving terrorism and Islamic insurgencies around the world. PMI states that its journal seeks to provide news on conflicts without promoting a political agenda and with a goal of providing in-depth, contextual, detailed reporting. The site's staff, led by Roggio, use international media sources plus contacts in the United States intelligence community for information for their reports. The organization is funded by p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eighth of Earth's inhabitable landmass. Russia extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones and shares Borders of Russia, land boundaries with fourteen countries, more than List of countries and territories by land borders, any other country but China. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, world's ninth-most populous country and List of European countries by population, Europe's most populous country, with a population of 146 million people. The country's capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city is Moscow, the List of European cities by population within city limits, largest city entirely within E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
