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9/11 Military Force Bill to Authorize Drone Strikes For Another 20 Years

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Photo Credit: APThe fight against al-Qaida could continue for another 20 years, a top Pentagon official told Congress Thursday as the administration warned against any changes to the 2001 law giving the president broad authority to use military force in the war on terror.

Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Assistant Defense Secretary Michael Sheehan said the Authorization for the Use of Military Force bill passed in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks still serves its purpose and will continue to be effective until al-Qaida is in “the ash heap of history.”

“In my judgment, this is going to go on for quite a while, yes, beyond the second term of the president . . . I think it’s at least 10 to 20 years, ” Sheehan told the panel.

Many lawmakers, however, have questioned whether the military force authorization bill should be rewritten, or perhaps even thrown out, given the increased use of drone strikes in places that some say are not true war zones. President Barack Obama has pledged to be more transparent about the drone program, which has included the use of nearly 400 CIA and military drone strikes, reports the Washington Post. But Sheehan told lawmakers that there are still no geographic boundaries on future drone use, noting that they would continue to take place anywhere that al-Qaida or other terrorist groups are considered a threat to U.S. national security interests.

Sen. John McCain called Sheehan’s testimony on drone policy and the use of force military force bill “disturbing.”

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Syrian Rebels Post Grisly Execution Video

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Photo Credit: YouTubeA gruesome video (warning: graphic content) posted Wednesday shows Syrian rebels in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor invoking sharia law as they sentence soldiers loyal to President Bashar Assad to death. The soldiers, kneeling and blindfolded, are then shot in the back of the head by a rebel whose face is hidden by a black balaclava.

The executioners claim to belong to the al-Nursa Front (Jabhat al-Nusra), a Syrian rebel cell associated with al-Qaeda, Reuters reported Thursday.

With the civil war in Syria between Assad’s forces and myriad insurgent groups entering its third year, and as both sides struggle for the upper hand in media coverage, increasingly unpalatable videos have been surfacing that expose the war at its most brutal.

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Black-Clad Hezbollah Now Fighting Rebels for Assad in Syria

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Photo Credit: Lynsey Addario Lebanon — Near Damascus, Hezbollah fighters are defending the shrine of Sayida Zeinab, revered by Shiite Muslims, from encroaching Sunni rebels. To the north, they are not just part of a Syrian government drive to take back the strategic town of Qusair, rebels say, they are leading it.

On Tuesday, Syrian opposition activists reported that rebels had killed 15 Hezbollah fighters in Qusair. But they also said the rebels were besieged in the town and in danger of losing it, after black-clad Hezbollah fighters swept them from surrounding villages.

Recruited and trained to battle Israel and defend Lebanon, Hezbollah’s Lebanese Shiite guerrillas are pushing more and more deeply into a very different fight: in neighboring Syria, against fellow Arab Muslims trying to topple President Bashar al-Assad. Their leaders have made it increasingly clear that Mr. Assad’s war is their war, too.

Though Hezbollah has never been militarily stronger — it has more than replenished the weapons and fighters it lost in its brief war with Israel in 2006 — it finds itself in an unaccustomed situation. It is struggling to preserve credibility at home and fend off an array of new challenges abroad as it fights what it sees as a battle to preserve Mr. Assad’s rule, and the crucial arms pipeline he provides.

Its chief patron, Iran, is suffering under sanctions over its nuclear program. Its members have been jailed on charges of helping to kill Israeli tourists in Bulgaria, as Europe considers joining the United States in labeling it a terrorist organization. It is facing heightened sectarian talk from its rivals in Lebanon — all while trying to keep its focus on its primary enemy, Israel.

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Syria, Iran Hint at Retaliation for ‘Unprecedented Escalation’ of Israeli Airstrikes in Civil War (+video)

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Israel rushed to beef up its rocket defenses on its northern border Sunday to shield against possible retaliation after carrying out two airstrikes in Syria over 48 hours – an unprecedented escalation of Israeli involvement in the Syrian civil war.

Syria and its patron Iran hinted at possible retribution, though the rhetoric in official statements appeared relatively muted.

Despite new concerns about a regional war, Israeli officials signaled they will keep trying to block what they see as an effort by Iran to send sophisticated weapons to Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia ahead of a possible collapse of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime.

Israel has repeatedly threatened to intervene in the Syrian civil war to stop the transfer of what it calls “game-changing” weapons to Hezbollah, a Syrian-backed group that battled Israel to a stalemate during a monthlong war in 2006.

Since carrying out a lone airstrike in January that reportedly destroyed a shipment of anti-aircraft missiles headed to Hezbollah, Israel had largely stayed on the sidelines. That changed over the weekend with a pair of airstrikes, including an attack near a sprawling military complex close to the Syrian capital of Damascus early Sunday that set off a series of powerful explosions.

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Syria Says Israeli Strike Hits Military Center (+video)

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Photo Credit: Daily StarBy The Daily Star. Massive explosions shook Damascus early Sunday and Syrian state media said Israeli missiles had hit a military research center on the outskirts of the capital.

“Initial information indicates that the explosions at the scientific research center in Jamraya near Damascus were caused by Israeli missiles,” the official SANA news agency. It gave no further details.

Damascus residents reported hearing massive blasts at 1:50 am Sunday.

“There was a large explosion. We first felt shakes like an earthquake and 30 seconds later heard gunfire,” one resident told The Daily Star by telephone from the Syrian capital.

“There was an electricity cut then a large boom.The door of my balcony opened from the after effect,” another resident said, adding that warplanes could be heard overhead.

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‘Israeli officials confirm Syria airstrike that hit Hezbollah-bound weapons’

By AP and Times of Israel Staff. Israeli officials on Saturday reportedly confirmed the Israeli Air Force carried out a strike against Syria and say it targeted a shipment of advanced missiles.

The officials said the shipment was not of chemical arms, but of “game changing” weapons bound for the terror group Hezbollah. One official said the target was a shipment of advanced, long-range ground-to-ground missiles.

The officials said the attack took place early Friday. It was not immediately clear where the airstrike took place, or whether the air force carried out the strike from Lebanese or Syrian airspace.

There was no immediate comment from Syrian officials, and no word of the airstrike on Syrian state media.

According to a source quoted by Reuters in a report Saturday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened his security cabinet for secret talks on Thursday night, hours before the strike. Read more from this story HERE.

Besieged Syrian Leader Makes Rare Public Appearance

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Photo Credit: APPresident Bashar al-Assad of Syria, apparently seeking to counter the impression of a leader in hiding after consecutive days of suspected insurgent bombings in his power base, Damascus, made a rare public appearance on Wednesday, visiting workers at an electric station.

Syrian state television and the official SANA news agency said that Mr. Assad mingled with workers at the Umayyad Electrical Station and congratulated them on the occasion of international Labor Day. Photographs showed Mr. Assad dressed in a dark suit as workers showed him the station.

“They want us to be afraid,” Mr. Assad said in one television clip. “Well, we won’t be afraid.” As he spoke, loyalists in the background chanted, “May God protect you.”

Mr. Assad, whose government is fighting an increasingly violent insurgency that grew out of his repression of peaceful political protests more than two years ago, is not often seen outside his heavily guarded presidential palace these days. His appearance followed an assassination attempt in the form of a car bombing on Monday aimed at his prime minister and a bombing on Tuesday that killed at least 13 people outside a former Interior Ministry building. The attacks were carried out in the heart of Damascus, the capital, which has remained basically under the control of Mr. Assad’s loyalist forces.

His visit to the power station coincided with a new set of explosions in central Damascus. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a group based in Britain but with a reporting network in Syria, said that rockets hit the neighborhood of Bab Mesalla, an area of shops and a transportation hub, and that a bomb detonated near the police headquarters on nearby Khalid bin Walid Street, a site of previous bomb attacks. SANA later confirmed the attacks, saying at least two people were killed and 28 were wounded. It attributed the attacks to terrorists, the Assad government’s blanket description for armed opponents.

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Syria: Al-Qaeda's Battle for Control of Assad's Chemical Weapons Plant

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Photo Credit: Getty Images By Colin Freeman. Set amid the rolling plains outside Aleppo, the town of al-Safira looks just like another vicious battleground in Syria’s civil war. On one side are lightly-armed rebels, on the other are government troops, and in between is a hotly-contested no-man’s land of bombed-out homes and burned-out military vehicles.

The fight for al-Safira is no ordinary turf war, however, and the prize can be found behind the perimeter walls of the heavily-guarded military base on the edge of town. Inside what looks like a drab industrial estate is one of Syria’s main facilities for producing chemical weapons – and among its products is sarin, the lethal nerve gas that the regime is now feared to be deploying in its bid to cling to power.

Last week, Washington said for the first time that it had evidence of Sarin being used in “small” amounts during combat operations in Syria, a move that President Barack Obama has long warned is a “red line” that President Bashar al-Assad must not cross.

But as the West now ponders its response, the fear is not just that President Assad might start using his chemical arsenal in much greater quantities. Of equal concern is the prospect of it falling into even less benign hands – a risk that the stand-off at al Safira illustrates clearly.

For among the rebel lines in al-Safira flutters the black flag of the al-Nusra Brigade, the jihadist group that recently declared its allegiance to al-Qaeda. Known for their fighting prowess honed in Iraq, they are now taking the lead in nearly every frontline in the Syrian war, and earlier this month, pushed to within just over a mile of al-Safira, only to for the Syrian troops to regain the ground last week. Read more from this story HERE.

Report: The Israeli Air Force Flew Into Syria And Bombed A Chemical Weapons Plant

By Robert Johnson. The Free Syrian Army (FSA) reports that Israeli fighter jets slipped into Damascus over the weekend and bombed a chemical weapons depot outside the city.

Neither Damascus nor Jerusalem have yet confirmed the attack, according to UPI.

According to The Jewish Press (JP) “many” reports came in over the weekend confirming the mission. Sources told the JP Israeli jets arrived over Damascus early Saturday morning and circled Assad’s presidential compound before moving on to target the weapons site.

The Israeli jets reportedly received fire but returned to base unscathed.

The Lebanese Daily Star confirms heavy FSA fighting occurred near the plant, the Scientific Studies and Research Center, but troops lacked the resources to breach the heavily fortified site. Read more from this story HERE.

Now That Syria Has Crossed Obama's 'Red Line' with Nerve Gas, What Next?

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Photo Credit: Reuters Israel’s top military intelligence analyst said in Tel Aviv on Tuesday that Syrian government forces had used chemical weapons – probably the nerve gas sarin – in their fight against rebels trying to force out President Bashar al-Assad.

He cited photographic evidence of victims foaming at the mouth, their pupils contracted.

The Israeli allegations, which came during a week-long visit by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to the Middle East, followed similar concerns of chemical weapons use voiced by Britain and France.

But so far, those assessments appear to lack the concrete proof Washington would need to accept the kind of deeper U.S. involvement in Syria’s civil war that Obama has resisted. That, in turn, raises questions about just how well-defined the president’s “red line” is.

White House spokesman Jay Carney walked a cautious line speaking to reporters, making clear that Washington was taking the Israeli accusations seriously but would require “conclusive evidence” before deciding whether to move forward.

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Syria: Two Prominent Christian Leaders Kidnapped by Rebels

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Photo Credit: FreedomHouseTwo prominent Syrian bishops, who had warned of the threat to religious tolerance and diversity from the two-year conflict in their country, were kidnapped on Monday by armed rebels in the northern province of Aleppo, state media said.

SANA news agency said the Syriac Orthodox and Greek Orthodox Archbishops of Aleppo, Yohanna Ibrahim and Paul Yazigi, were seized by “a terrorist group” in the village of Kfar Dael as they were “carrying out humanitarian work.”

A Syriac member of the opposition Syrian National Coalition, Abdulahad Steifo, said the men had been kidnapped on the road to Aleppo from the rebel-held Bab al Hawa crossing with Turkey.

Several prominent Muslim clerics have been killed in Syria’s uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, but the two bishops are the most senior church leaders caught up in the conflict which has killed more than 70,000 people across Syria.

Christians make up less than 10 percent of the country’s 23 million people and, like other religious minorities, many have been wary of the mainly Sunni Muslim uprising against Assad, whose Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

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Obama Doubles Aid to Muslim Brotherhood-Dominated Rebels in Syria

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Photo Credit: AP

The United States said Sunday that it will double its non-lethal assistance to Syria’s opposition as the rebels’ top supporters vowed to enhance and expand their backing of the two-year battle to oust President Bashar Assad’s regime.

Yet the pledge fell far short of what the opposition had made clear it wanted: weapons and direct military intervention to stop the violence that has killed more than 70,000 people. The Syrian National Coalition had sought drone strikes on sites from which the regime has fired missiles, the imposition of no-fly zones and protected humanitarian corridors to ensure the safety of civilians.

Instead, the Obama administration’s pledged to provide an additional $123 million in aid, which may include for the first time armored vehicles, body armor, night vision goggles and other defensive military supplies. It was the only tangible, public offer of new international support as the foreign ministers of the 11 main countries supporting the opposition met in a marathon session in Istanbul.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the new package of assistance in a written statement at the conclusion of the conference that began Saturday afternoon and stretched into early Sunday.

The additional aid, which brings total non-lethal U.S. assistance to the opposition to $250 million since the fighting began, “underscores the United States’ firm support for a political solution to the crisis in Syria and for the opposition’s advancement of an inclusive, tolerant vision for a post-Assad Syria,” he said.

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