Redazione Islamedianalysis, Autore presso Islam Media Analysis

Bomb thrown at Iranian-Swedish politician’s home after she criticized Iran’s regime

27 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

An incendiary bomb was thrown at an Iranian-Swedish politician’s home after she received threatening phone calls over her criticism of the Iranian regime, like reported by alarabiya.net.

Soheila Fors, an Iranian-born member of Sweden’s Christian Democrats party, said on Sunday that her family was awakened by the sound of the bomb that was thrown onto her porch in the middle of the night.

“Around 01:00 a.m. on Friday my family woke up to the sound of a loud explosion. An incendiary bomb had been dropped on the porch,” Fors said in an interview with the United Associations for a Free Iran (FFFI), a Sweden-based Iranian opposition group.

Prior to the incident, Fors had received several threatening calls from unknown men. She said that she believed that the attack is related to her criticism of the Iranian regime.

“[The unknown callers] threatened to kill me and my family because of my activities against the regime in Iran,” Fors told FFFI.

“My only takeaway is that the Iranian regime was behind this attack,” she added.

“I am neither surprised nor afraid, but I am worried about the safety of my children. My eldest daughter, who lives in the US and is visiting us for the summer holidays, is still in shock.”

Swedish police launched an investigation into the incident.

“If you ever read that I am gone, know that the Iranian regime is culpable,” Fors wrote on Facebook.

Iran has a long history of targeting dissidents abroad, especially in Europe. Last month, an Iranian Kurdish activist survived an assassination attempt after he was “seriously injured” in a knife attack in the Netherlands.

Why the Islamic State is against the Coronavirus vaccine?

27 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

After months of upheaval and more than half a million deaths, the world is anxiously awaiting the development of a safe and effective coronavirus vaccine. While there is still uncertainty regarding when, or even if, such a vaccine will arrive, most hope one of several promising vaccine candidates will succeed soon, like reported by nationalinterest.org.

But there are also dissenters, some violent.

In addition to familiar false claims from “anti-vaxxers” that vaccines cause childhood illness, the still unrealized coronavirus vaccine has also spawned an outlandish set of alarmingly popular conspiracy theories, some involving microchips and Bill Gates. Yet to receive serious attention, however, are a set of dangerous actors capable of disrupting the arrival of a coronavirus vaccine: jihadi terrorists.

Jihadi terrorist organizations have both the motivation and means to undermine future coronavirus vaccination efforts. Perhaps most motivated is the Islamic State, an organization that celebrates the pandemic as punishment sent by God against their “disbelieving” enemies. Already, the group has seized on the “perfect storm” of social and political upheaval created by the virus as an opportunity to validate its hateful worldview, attract new recruits and achieve gains on the ground.

The longer the pandemic lasts and the more attendant political and economic strife it generates, the more the organization stands to benefit. This raises the possibility that the group will attempt to disrupt future vaccination efforts to prolong, what is for them, a useful crisis.

In our hyper-connected world, interrupted or reduced access to vaccines can prevent eradication and lead to the resurgence of vaccine-preventable diseases, as has occurred with cholera, polio, and measles in recent years. Alarmingly, the Islamic State and other jihadi extremists have acted to disrupt vaccinations in the past, including with brutal attacks on vaccination centers and personnel.

Similar interruptions to coronavirus vaccination drives remain well within the capabilities of the Islamic State organization, which still controls an estimated 12,000 fighters in Iraq alone and has retained the ability to coordinate shocking global attacks.

Unfortunately, beyond physical attacks, the group also has at its disposal powerful arguments to instill fear and distrust around the vaccine—a tactic that could prove even more damaging. Most notably, the group can point to the CIA’s misuse of a hepatitis B vaccination drive as cover for intelligence collection in the hunt for Osama bin Laden. This misuse gave credence to existing suspicions the West was using vaccination campaigns to identify targets for drone strikes, or even to sterilize children. As a result, vaccinators were assassinated at the hands of extremists and many tens of thousands of children went unvaccinated.

Despite its absolutist proclamations that infection is a matter of God’s judgement alone, the Islamic State is also capable of a more pragmatic approach to the biological realities of the virus. At times, for example, the Islamic State has advocated hygienic and social distancing precautions for its followers.

Similar pragmatic considerations have played a role in determining the Islamic State’s response to outbreaks of infectious disease in the past as well as vaccination campaigns.

In 2015, for example, the Islamic State surprised many observers when it granted polio vaccination teams access to areas under its control in Iraq and Syria. Later that same year, however, the group was actively preventing vaccinations in Afghanistan. The difference between these two behaviors was political. In Iraq and Syria, the organization was at the height of its power and intent on demonstrating competence as a government. It recognized that a polio outbreak among its subjects constituted a serious and avoidable political lability. In Afghanistan, by contrast, the group was struggling to establish a foothold and found more advantage in using brutal suppression to bolster its ideological bona fides than in cultivating popular consent through the provision of public health.

The Islamic State of today is not likely to see the same benefit to cooperation that it did in Iraq and Syria years ago. Reduced to a guerilla force in most of its former territory and freed from the responsibilities of governance, the group stands to benefit most from perpetuating the disarray caused by the pandemic.

The threat of jihadi spoilers should be taken seriously. Leaders should prepare to protect vaccination teams and work to inoculate vulnerable populations against both the virus and misinformation surrounding it. But beyond these immediate concerns, the international community can seize upon a global coronavirus vaccination campaign to land a lasting blow against the Islamic State and other jihadist actors.

Already, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention is working to create a “ranking system” that would move more at-risk Americans to the front of the line for initial vaccine doses. A similar system should be devised to ensure an equitable global rollout.

Ensuring low-income, conflict-ridden countries—those susceptible to both the virus and extremism—receive timely and equitable access to early vaccine supplies is the most humanitarian and logical approach to ending the pandemic. It is also a rare opportunity to prominently refute the negative caricatures of the international community, especially the West, that jihadi terrorist use to sustain their cause.

To capitalize on this opportunity, governments must resist the temptation to hoard what will be limited early supplies of the vaccine for their own populations. Nations, especially the United States, must embrace a multilateral solution, not withdraw from vital international organizations.

If the international community can uphold commitments to equitable access and prevent disruption by jihadi spoilers, a coronavirus vaccine could surprise the world by being both a global health and counter-terror success story.

Pakistani foreign terrorist fighters fuel violence in Afghanistan

27 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

The National Defence Security and Afghanistan National Army (ANA) are combing certain hot spots to flush out terrorists. An operation at Mirza Khel in Khogyani district led to the killing of 31 militants, asianlite.com. Sources said the toll includes 18 Afghan Taliban and 13 Pakistani militants belonging to Jaish-e-Mohammed. These miltants were affiliated to Maulsvi Sohail based at Khogyani. A miltant has been captured alive who is reportedly from JeM.

The violence against Afghan civilians and troops are on the rise in recent past. At least 250 Afghan security force members were killed and over 300 others injured in 220 attacks carried out by the Taliban in the past three weeks in the 11 provinces of the country.

The TOLO News report said the majority of casualties among the government forces occurred in the north and southeast regions of the country.

Under the US-Taliban peace agreement which was signed in Doha on February 29, the Taliban committed to not stage attacks on the key highways and provincial capitals. However, over the recent days, Zabul-Kandahar, Baghlan-Samangan and Kabul-Nangarhar highways have witnessed massive attacks, said the TOLO News report. Of the 11 provinces, Kunduz has witnessed heavy clashes.

In another development, a report submitted to the United Nations Security Council indicates that the total number of “Pakistani foreign terrorist fighters” in Afghanistan is estimated at “between 6,000 and 6,500, most of them with Jaesh-e-Mohammed and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).’

The presence of Pakistani militants in Afghanistan will put the Islamic republic in a tight spot over their commitments to Financial Action Task Force (FATF), which clearly ordered Pakistan to disassociate from all sort of terror funding and terror activities.

The FATF plays a crucial role in combatting terrorism. It sets global standards to combat terrorist financing, assisting jurisdictions in implementing financial provisions of the United Nations Security Council resolutions on terrorism, and evaluating countries’ ability to prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute the financing of terrorism.

The report says the TTP fighters in Afghanistan are led by Amir Noor Wali Mehsud, supported by his deputy Qari Amjad and TTP spokesperson Mohammad Khorasani, Tolo news reported.

The report says that according to UN member states, “Al Qaeda is covertly active in 12 Afghan provinces and Aiman al-Zawahiri remains based in the country.”

The report says that the UN Monitoring Team estimates the total number of Al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan at “between 400 and 600 and that the leadership maintains close contact with the Haqqani network.”

In February 2020, “al-Zawahiri met with Yahya Haqqani, the primary Haqqani Network contact with Al Qaeda since mid-2009, to discuss ongoing cooperation,” the report said.

The report says that according to Member States, the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM), presence in Afghanistan is mainly in Badakhshan, Kunduz and Takhar Provinces.

Approximately “500 fighters of the group operate in Badakhshan, primarily in Raghistan and Warduj Districts,” the report says.

The report says Daesh has suffered further severe reverses in its former Afghan strongholds of Nangarhar and Kunar provinces, but it is too soon to discount it as a threat.

Although in territorial retreat, Daesh remains capable of carrying out high-profile attacks in various parts of the country, including Kabul, the report says.

Daesh also aims to attract Taliban fighters who oppose the agreement with the United States, the report added, saying that in case of further military pressure on Daesh in Kunar, the group is expected to retreat to Badakhshan and other northern provinces.

A number of other terrorist groups are active in Afghanistan, most operating under the umbrella of the Taliban but some aligned with Daesh.

Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) operates under the Taliban umbrella from Nimruz, Helmand and Kandahar provinces, the report says, adding that the group reportedly has between 150 and 200 members from Bangladesh, India, Myanmar and Pakistan.

The current leader of AQIS is Osama Mahmood, who succeeded the late Asim Umar. AQIS is reportedly planning retaliation operations in the region to avenge the death of its former leader, according to the report.

Turkey forges military pact with Niger, Libya’s neighbour

27 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

The signing of a military agreement with Niger, a neighbouring country of Libya, reflects Turkey’s interest to have a foothold in a country adjacent to Libya, The New Khalij reported.

The agreement was reached during last week’s tour by the Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu of Africa, as Niger was among the African countries he visited.

Çavuşoğlu met with President of Niger Mahamadou Issoufou, and both sides discussed the effects of the unstable security situation in Libya on their countries.

The New Khalij disclosed that Turkey, which has military agreements with Libya, does not have ground borders with it. Therefore, it expected that it would be difficult for it to deal with the issue when it comes to military confrontation with Egypt, which supports the renegade Libyan Commander Khalifa Haftar.

Consequently, The New Khalij explained that there is a possibility of a ground confrontation in light of the continuous remarks by Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi, who continues pledging to stop Turkish support for the UN-backed Libyan government in Tripoli.

During the visit to Niger, Çavuşoğlu expressed: “We would like to make a contribution to Niger’s development in the areas of transportation, construction, energy, mining and agriculture.”

As part of the Turkish cooperation with Africa, Anadolu Agency reported that the Turkish government has donated millions of dollars for infrastructure development on the continent and has sponsored hundreds of African students.

Turkey’s presence is felt across the continent, where there are a number of Turkish organisations, including the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA), Maarif Foundation and Yunus Emre Institute, among others.

Sudan to send more troops to Darfur after deadly attacks

27 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

The Sudanese government is sending more troops to the restive Darfur region, following a spike in violence there, like reported by bbc.com.

Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said the forces would protect people during the farming season.

Unidentified gunmen killed more than 60 people in the region on Saturday, and another 20 the day before, the UN said.

Hundreds of thousands of people have died in fighting between government forces and rebels since 2003. Millions have been forced from their homes.

In the latest upsurge, several villages were burned, and markets and shops looted, said the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

“The escalation of violence in different parts of Darfur region is leading to increased displacement, compromising the agricultural season, causing loss of lives and livelihoods and driving growing humanitarian needs,” it said in a statement.

No group has so far said it carried out the attacks.

Former President Omar al-Bashir, who was overthrown last year, is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and genocide in the region.

Last week, the 76-year-old went on trial in Sudan’s capital Khartoum in connection with the 1989 military coup that brought him to power.

He could face the death penalty if found guilty.

Nigeria: Islamic State group says it killed 5 aid workers

24 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

Militants from an Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility Thursday for killing five aid workers who were kidnapped last month in northeastern Nigeria, like reported by abcnews.go.com.

The Islamic State West Africa Province, which broke away from Boko Haram several years ago, warned in June that it would target Nigerians working for international aid agencies along with those who helped the military. Nigeria’s president already had blamed the extremists for the slayings.

The group issued its claim online in its digital weekly newspaper, al-Naba, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist groups. The aid workers were killed on Sunday, and a video of their deaths was later released on social media, SITE reported.

The alarming development threatens to further complicate relief efforts in northeastern Nigeria, where nearly 2 million people have been displaced by the ongoing insurgency. The U.N. World Food Program says 3 million in the northeast are facing hunger, and now also threatened by COVID-19.

The five were traveling by road to the state capital of Maiduguri when they were abducted last month by the militants. Nigeria’s presidency said the victims had worked for the Nigerian government and three international aid agencies: Action Against Hunger, International Rescue Committee and REACH International.

“They were committed humanitarians who devoted their lives to helping vulnerable people and communities in an area heavily affected by violence,” said Edward Kallon, the U.N.’s humanitarian coordinator in Nigeria.

Security has long been a concern for aid groups operating in the northeast, where humanitarian workers have been repeatedly kidnapped and killed during Boko Haram’s decade-long insurgency against the Nigerian government.

Those concerns have deepened though since the Boko Haram splinter faction warned last month that it would target civilians who help humanitarian groups. The splinter group previously was not known to target Muslim civilians but left threatening pamphlets in June.

Like Bosnia mujahideen, returning Islamic State fighters will haunt UK

24 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace reminded the Commons this week that, despite their territorial defeat, Islamic State remains the greatest terror threat to the United Kingdom by a long way. He added that some 360 members who joined the terrorist group in Iraq and Syria and returned to the UK are deemed ‘low risk” like reported by unherd.com.

If this doesn’t inspire confidence, it shouldn’t. Some of the worst attacks in recent years have been conducted by people already on the security services’ radar.

Khalid Masood, the Westminster Bridge attacker, and Salman Abedi, responsible for the Manchester bombing were both known to security services before they struck. In fact, one of the 2017 London Bridge attackers’ extremism was so well known he appeared in a Channel 4 documentary. Forget ‘lone wolves’ — try known wolves.

This is not the fault of our overwhelmed security services. There is no secret formula for making an assessment on who poses a risk and when, and they have no choice but to de-prioritise some cases. But some of the de-prioritised will strike.

Besides, they aren’t the only ones making mistakes. Usman Khan was considered a poster boy for the Cambridge ‘Learning Together’ program, before going on a murder spree at Fishmonger’s Hall, London Bridge.

MI5 is aware of some 43,000 people who pose a threat. Among those are an unprecedented number of extremists in prison — many of whom are on their way out — and several hundred Brits now have first-hand experience in Islamic State.

This danger will not be short-lived. The long arc of jihadism inside Britain stretches back 30 years when large numbers of British mujahideen left these shores to fight in Bosnia, Somalia and Chechnya. Nearly 30 years after the Bosnia conflict, some of the jihadi alumni are still haunting us, like the former London public schoolboy who helped murder journalist Daniel Pearl and now looks set for release in Pakistan.

The earliest set of returnees may not have committed any attacks, but their war stories helped to socialise new generations, leading some to call Bosnia the ‘cradle of modern jihad.’ The cohort they produced will likely do the same and metastasise the jihadi threat, which poses a danger because they carry no ideological aversion to attacks at home. For all the controversy, it’s little wonder the government didn’t want them back.

A new generation of jihadists will emerge from the ISIS wound in the coming years. Some will answer the next call to wage jihad overseas, while others will wage an attritional jihad at home. We might be suffering a bout of Jihad nauseam, but the jihadists are not done with us yet.

Afghan army releases photo of militants who joined Taliban after being released from prison

24 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

The Afghan army released a photo a couple of militants who joined Taliban ranks after being released from prison few weeks ago, like reported by khaama.com.

The 209th Shaheen Corps issued a photo of Taliban militants who were allegedly arrested during an operation, few weeks after after they were released from prison.

According to a statement released by Shaheen Corps, the two militants took oath by placing their hands on Holy Quran after being released from prison but arrested by joining the Taliban ranks.

The statement further added that the security forces arrested the two militants during an operation which they conducted in Sheesha Khana area of Faizabad district in Jawzjan province.

The security forces apprehended the two militants as they were planning to ambush the security forces in the area, the 209th Shaheen Corps added.

The Taliban group has not commented in this regard so far.

French soldier killed in combat in Mali

24 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

A French soldier from the army’s First Parachute Hussar Regiment was killed in combat in Mali, President Emmanuel Macron’s office said Thursday.

“This soldier … was killed in fighting against armed terrorist groups, when an improvised explosive device was triggered next to his armoured vehicle,” the presidency said in a statement.

France has more than 5,000 troops in the West African Sahel region as part of international efforts to fight Islamist militants in the area.

The news of the French soldier’s death came as leaders of five West African countries were holding a one-day summit in the Malian capital, Bamako, in a bid to resolve the country’s escalating political and security crises.

The presidents of Senegal, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria and Niger were meeting with Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita and leaders of a protest movement clamouring for his resignation.

The unrest deeply worries Mali’s neighbours and allies, who fear a country bloodied by a jihadist insurgency could slide into chaos.

The impoverished nation of around 20 million people has been struggling to contain an insurgency that first emerged in the north in 2012 before spreading to its centre, as well as neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Thousands of soldiers and civilians have died in the conflict, and hundreds of thousands of people have been driven from their homes.

France started its military operations in Mali in 2013, after northern Mali was seized by Islamist extremists who had hijacked a Tuareg rebellion in the country’s northern desert regions the previous year.

The French military successfully drove extremists from several key towns, but the jihadist insurgency has since spread throughout Mali and across the border to Niger and Burkina Faso.

Will Syrian rebels kill each other in Libya’s proxy war?

24 Luglio 2020 By Redazione Islamedianalysis

In “The Return,” Hisham Matar’s haunting 2016 memoir about seeking to uncover his missing father’s fate in the hands of the late Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, the author pays tribute to a cousin who fought valorously in the North African nation’s 2011 revolution. Following Tripoli’s liberation in August 2011, Hamad traveled to Syria to help like-minded revolutionaries there overthrow their own ruthless strongman, Bashar al-Assad, like reported by al-monitor.com.

Nine years on, Syrian rebels are streaming into Libya. But their motives are decidedly different. They are going for the money. As their war-shattered country descends into deeper misery under US sanctions, and with no end in sight, many are enlisting to fight on opposite sides of Libya’s ongoing civil conflict pitting the internationally recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) against the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by the eastern warlord Khalifa Hifter. The emergence of Syrian mercenaries is the latest cruel twist in Syria’s nine-year-long conflict that has claimed at least 400,000 lives, internally displaced more than 6.2 million people and led roughly 5.2 million more to flee the country, according to the United Nations. Some of the Syrian fighters headed to Libya are children, in breach of international law.

“What we are now faced with is a scenario in which Syrians who fought together to overthrow Assad are now going to be shooting at each other in a foreign land,” said Bassem al-Ahmed, the co-founder of Syrians for Truth and Justice, a nonpartisan advocacy group that monitors human rights in Syria, including the plight of Syrians going to fight in Libya. Ahmed, who is Syrian, said, “I would have never imagined we would be in this situation. It’s an absolute travesty.”

Emadeddin Badi, a Libyan and nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said the arrival of Syrian mercenaries in his country “is illustrative of the fact that Syrians’ hope for change has been turned to ash by Assad and a passive international community. So it isn’t that the favor [to Libyans who came to fight in Syria] is returned, more so that both Libya and Syria’s revolutions have turned to tragedy.”

“Not everyone is happy with the Syrians in Libya, even amongst the camp that they have been brought to support,” Badi added in emailed comments to Al-Monitor.

The warring parties in Libya have accused the other of importing radical jihadis and assorted criminals to bolster their ranks, part of a propaganda war that is being waged by the Turkish and Qatari media on one hand and the United Arab Emirates and the Egyptian media on the other, with sympathizers of the rival sides weighing in as well.

The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), which has been monitoring the Syrian conflict through a network of local sources, recently alleged that Turkish intelligence had transferred “jihadist groups and Islamic State (IS) members of different foreign nationalities from Syria to Libya in the past few months.” The SOHR maintains they included over 2,500 Tunisian IS fighters. Aaron Y. Zelin, a Richard Borow fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and author of “Your Sons Are At Your Service: Tunisia’s Missionaries of Jihad,” debunked the claims, telling Al-Monitor in emailed comments that they were “straight up not credible.”

The Pentagon’s inspector general concluded in a July 17 report that Turkey had sent between 3,500 and 3,800 paid Syrian fighters to Libya over the first three months of this year.

Despite allegations by Hifter and his UAE and Egyptian backers, the US military found no evidence to suggest the men were linked to either IS or al-Qaeda.

“The Libyans who went to Syria in 2011 went out of solidarity to do in Syria what they had done in Libya: overthrow a dictator. It was only in 2012 that you saw Libyans go for overt jihadi reasons. So, what they did was foreign fighting,” Zelin said. “What we are seeing now with the Syrians going to Libya is different because it’s mercenary activity. Foreign fighting and being a mercenary are two different phenomena. The former is more about solidarity and ideological conviction with a cause; the latter is about receiving money, a gun for hire.”

Turkey’s intervention earlier this year with officers, heavy weapons, warships and drones, together with the injection of Syrian mercenaries, has tipped the war in favor of the GNA. Hifter was forced to call off his yearlong campaign to capture Tripoli in May and beat a humiliating retreat. Turkey and Russia have slapped a band-aid on the conflict for now, with mutual pledges to seek a political resolution, the risk of renewed escalation remains. The ongoing recruitment of Syrian mercenaries is an ominous sign. Turkey and the GNA have vowed to press on till they capture Sirte. The coastal city where Gadhafi met his bloody end is the strategic gateway to the bulk of Libya’s oil, currently controlled by the LNA.

While there are numerous accounts documenting how thousands of Syrians are being recruited by the Turkish-backed opposition Syrian National Army to fight on the side of GNA forces, there is less information available about Syrians fighting on behalf of Hifter.

Mercenaries from neighboring countries like Chad and Sudan have taken part in the Libyan conflict since 2011. But Hifter’s Libyan Arab Armed Forces “is the first post-revolutionary Libyan entity to systematically import them and is now more reliant on them than any other Libyan entity,” said Tarek Megerisi, a policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.

The embargo on oil produced in areas under his control has depleted Hifter’s war chest, leaving his top backer and Turkey’s top regional foe, the UAE, to foot the bill. “The [LNA] is effectively desperate for foreign fighters that are competent on the battlefield and who will listen to orders. Syrians are great from the [LNA’s] perspective because they’re cheap bodies to put on the line, as crude as that is,” said Megerisi.

Syrian Arab tribes have put out public statements condemning the exploitation of their youths by the Wagner Group. The Russians reportedly began taking Syrians to fight in Libya last year. Wagner typically refuses to comment.

The UN said Wagner had at least 1,200 men fighting in Libya, according to a report that was leaked in May. The Kremlin denies involvement in such activities, including sending at least 14 warplanes to a central Libyan air base. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov last week insisted “the Russian military is not involved in any processes in Libya in any way.”

Megerisi reckons there is also a “geopolitical angle” to putting Syrian boots on the ground. It serves the Kremlin’s agenda of “strengthening the Russia, [Syrian President] Bashar [al-Assad], UAE triangle that’s forming,” he told Al-Monitor. In March, members of Hifter’s “government” established a diplomatic mission in Damascus. The move was welcomed by Moscow.

Syrians for Truth and Justice and its team of digital fact-checkers have pieced together further details of how Syrians are being recruited and taken to Libya to fight for Hifter with the help of Russia. The information will be made available in a report that is due to be published in the coming days and was seen exclusively by Al-Monitor. It’s the bookend to a May report that focused on Syrians recruited by Turkey for the GNA. They include members of militias who have committed war crimes against Syria’s Kurdish population.

Based on eyewitness testimony and fighters’ accounts of the Syrian government’s collusion with the Russian military and Wagner, the latest report describes how an estimated 3,000 men (at least 22 of whom are children) from Suwayda, Daraa, Quneitra, Hama, Homs, Raqqa, Deir ez-Zor and rural Damascus were recruited. They notably include former opposition rebels who fought in the US-backed Southern Front who have signed so-called settlement or amnesty agreements with the Syrian government. Salaries range from $800 to $1,500, a veritable fortune in Syria where the collapse of the pound has pauperized a broad swath of the population.

One recruit from Suwayda who went by the pseudonym Rami M. told Syrians for Truth and Justice he had applied to go to Libya via the regime-sanctioned Syrian National Youth Party. A party official had told some 80 fellow recruits at an initiation gathering that criminal charges against those who fought in rebel factions would be dropped and they would be exempted from reserve military service. “He told us that in Libya, we will be fighting under the supervision of the Russian Wagner company,” Rami M. said.

Another recruit, identified as Yousef A. from Quneitra, said, “I operated within the ranks of the Free [Syrian] Army against the regime, and like the majority of the fighters of southern Syria’s factions, I signed a settlement agreement. The regime, however, did not write off the security reports filed against me, not to mention the poor financial conditions I am enduring, [rising prices and the lack of] job opportunities that turned life into hell. For this reason, I joined the ranks of the fighters in Libya, helped by the Russia-affiliated 5th Legion [of the Syrian Arab Army], because they promised to give a $1,000 salary and cancel all the reports on me under Russian guarantees.”

A third recruit, identified as Asem, who also applied to go to Libya through the Syrian National Youth Party, said he and 150 fellow recruits were supposed to undergo 15 days of training before being deployed. He said “there were Russian officers with us and a captain in the [Syrian] army” present at a meeting in early January at the headquarters of the Syrian army’s 18th division in rural Homs. Asem dropped out upon learning that he would not be guarding Libyan oil fields as originally advertised.

Syrians for Truth and Justice’s Ahmed said he was “shocked” that former opposition rebels would be going to Libya at all, as they would potentially find themselves killing fellow ex-Syrian rebels in the enemy ranks. “Maybe it’s a strategic plan by the Syrian regime. Maybe it’s forcing them to go in order to get rid of them,” he speculated.

The fighters are transferred to Libya either via commercial flights from Damascus and Latakia on Cham Wings or from Russia’s Hmeimim air base in Latakia onboard Russian Tupolev jets. What happens to them once they get there is unclear.

“I am working to get access to fighters who are in Libya fighting for the LNA. It’s extremely difficult [because] they don’t have phones on them or internet. They call their families very rarely when they manage to get hold of a phone, and no one has come back yet. It’s pretty new,” said Elizabeth Tsurkov, a fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. Tsurkov, who is renowned in the policy community for her vast network of contacts inside Syria, was the first foreign researcher to flag the recruitment of Syrians to fight in Libya by the Wagner group on her Twitter feed.

“I would say speaking with members of communities from which these fighters went is that all of them did so due to financial incentives. This applies to fighters who are fighting on the GNA side as well as on the Hifter side. No one has any particular interest in the war that is happening in Libya. Very few knew much about it before going there,” Tsurkov said in a telephone interview with Al-Monitor.

“They are in desperate need of money. The salaries that are offered to them in Libya are 20 times more than what they are earning in Syria as fighters. As far as I understand now from both sides, at this stage, there are more people who are interested in going than the number of people who are needed both by Turkey and Wagner. This just shows us the sad state of the situation in Syria,” Tsurkov observed.