It's too late to keep the foreigners out Maggie, Russia was first in, though you don't seem to mind them being there, and now the Libyans, as I had predicted two months ago, have joined the fray.
And you can't deny that this is a direct result of the Arab Spring dominoes.
The rebuilding of a new society can't begin until the power is taken from Assad, as he would rather his country be destroyed than give up his family's ownership of the nation.
The Umma Brigade - taking it to another level.
Revolutionary Program: Libyan's Umma Brigade in Syria
Exclusive: Libyan fighters join Syrian revolt
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/1...6G20120814
By Mariam Karouny
BEIRUT | Tue Aug 14, 2012 7:32am EDT
(Reuters) - Veteran fighters of last year's civil war in Libya have come to the front-line in
Syria, helping to train and organize rebels under conditions far more dire than those in the battle against Muammar Gaddafi, a Libyan-Irish fighter has told Reuters.
Hussam Najjar hails from Dublin, has a Libyan father and Irish mother and goes by the name of Sam. A trained sniper, he was part of the rebel unit that stormed Gaddafi's compound in Tripolia year ago, led by Mahdi al-Harati, a powerful militia chief from Libya's western mountains.
Harati now leads a unit in Syria, made up mainly of Syrians but also including some foreign fighters, including20 senior members of his own Libyan rebel unit. He asked Najjar to join him from Dublin a few months ago, Najjar said.
The Libyans aiding the Syrian rebels include specialists in communications, logistics, humanitarian issues and heavy weapons, he said. Theyoperate training bases, teaching fitness and battlefield tactics.
Najjar said he was surprised to find how poorly armed and disorganized the Syrian rebels were, describing Syria's Sunni Muslim majority as far more repressed and down trodden under Assad than Libyans were underGaddafi.
"I was shocked. There is nothing you are told that can prepare you for what you see. The state of the Sunni Muslims there - their state of mind, their fate - all of those things have been slowly corroded overtime by the regime."
"I nearly cried for them when I saw the weapons. The guns are absolutely useless. We are being sold left overs from the Iraqi war, leftovers from this and that," he said. "Luckily these are things that we can do for them: we know how to fix weapons, how to maintain them, find problems and fix them."
In the months since he arrived, the rebel arsenal had become "five times more powerful", he said. Fighters had obtained large caliber anti-aircraft guns and sniper rifles.
Disorganization is a serious problem. Unlike the Libyan fighters, who enjoyed the protection of a NATO-imposed no-fly zone and were able to set up full-scale training camps, the rebels in Syria are never out of reach of Assad's air power.
"In Libya, with the no-fly zone, we were able to build up say 1,400 to 1,500 men in one place and have platoons and brigades. Here we have men scattered here, there and everywhere."
LACK OF UNITY
Although many rebel units fight under the banner of the Free Syrian Army, their commands are localized and poorly coordinated, Najjar said.
"One of the biggest factors delaying the revolution isthe lack of unity among the rebels," he said. "Unfortunately, it isonly when their back is up against the wall that they start to realize theyshould (unite)."
Syria's uprising has evolved into an all-out civil war with sectarian overtones, pitting the mainly Sunni rebels against security forces dominated by Assad's minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Assad is backed by Shi'ite-led
Iran and opposed by most Arab states, which are ruled by Sunnis.
"This is not just about the fall of Assad. This is about the Sunni Muslims of Syria taking back their country and pushing out the minority that have been oppressing them for generations now," Najjar said.
The presence of foreign fighters is a sensitive issue for Syria's rebels. Assad's government has taken to referring to the rebels as "Gulf-Turkish forces", accusing the Sunni-led Arab Gulf states and
Turkey of arming, funding and leading them.
Harati's unit is known as the Umma Brigade, referring to the global community of Muslims. Najjar said thousands more Sunni fighters from the Arab world were gathering in neighboring countries prepared to join the cause.
Harati is reluctant to enlist them because he does not want his cause tarnished by the perception that foreign Islamists are linked to alQaeda, Najjar said, but he said that many of the foreigners were making theirway to Syria ontheir own.
The Umma Brigade's Facebook page shows a picture of Najj araiming his rifle in what looks like an open field. In another he is posing withHarati and rebels. A YouTube video shows Harati leading an attack on acheckpoint in Maarat al-Numan in Syria.
Najjar said militancy would spread across the region as longas the West does not do more to hasten the downfall of Assad.
"The Western governments are bringing this upon themselves. The longer they leave this door open for this torture and this massacre to carry on, the more young men will drop what they have in this lifeand search for the afterlife," Najjar said.
"If the West and other countries do not move fast it will no longer be just guys like me - normal everyday guys that might do anything from have a cigarette to go out on the town - it will be the real extreme guys who will take it to another level."
(Editing by Peter Graff)
