• Syria: the foreign fighters joining the war against Bashar al-Assad (The Guardian)
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/23/syria-foreign-fighters-joining-war

    Soldiers! Soldiers!" The man hissed his warning as he hurried past, two bullets from a government sniper kicking up dust from the dirt road behind him. It was enough for Abu Omar al-Chechen. His ragtag band of foreign fighters, known as “muhajiroun brothers”, was huddled in the doorway of a burned-out apartment building in the university district of Aleppo. One of the brothers – a Turk – lay dead in the road around the corner and a second brother lay next to him, badly wounded and unable to move. They had been unable to rescue him because of the sniper. (...) Source: The Guardian

  • Où l’on reparle de nos amis « pas vraiment d’Al Qaeda » du poste frontière de Bab al Hawa. L’article (qu’il faut vraiment lire) du Guardian indique pourquoi la brigade al-Farouq se serait opposée à eux : avant tout parce qu’ils donnent une mauvaise image qui pourrait effrayer les soutiens turques et occidentaux, et faire avorter une intervention de l’OTAN :
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/23/syria-foreign-fighters-joining-war

    At the border post of Bab al Hawa some days later, a confrontation was brewing between the jihadis and Syrian rebels.

    Fighters from the Farouq brigade – one of the best-equipped and most disciplined units in the FSA – were sleeping on the grass in the shadow of a big concrete arch. The fighters wore military uniforms and green T-shirts emblazoned with insignia of the brigade – an achievement in the disarray of the revolution. They had many tanks and armoured vehicles captured from the Syrian army parked around the border post, under cover.

    Nearby, a group of 20 jihadis had gathered in a circle around a burly Egyptian with a chest-long silver beard.

    “You are in confrontation with two apostate armies,” the Egyptian told the men, referring to the Syrian army and Free Syrian Army. “When you have finished with one army you will start with the next.”

    The confrontation had started a few weeks ago, when the foreign jihadis, who played a major role in defeating government forces at the border post, raised the black flag of al-Qaida, emblazoned by the seal of the prophet, on the border post.

    The Farouq brigade demanded the flag be lowered lest it antagonise the Turks and threaten the rebels’ vital supply route. One bearded fighter in the Farouq brigade, a salafi himself, said he had pleaded with jihadis, telling them that their presence would stop Nato from sending supplies. “They told me they were here to stop Nato,” he said.

  • Syria: the foreign fighters joining the war against Bashar al-Assad
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/23/syria-foreign-fighters-joining-war

    Hundreds of international fighters have flocked to Syria to join the war against Bashar al-Assad’s government. Some are fresh-faced idealists driven by a romantic notion of revolution or a hatred for the Assads. Others are jihadi veterans of Iraq, Yemen and Afghanistan.

    […]

    According to the Saudi, it was an easy walk from Turkey to the small Syrian town of Atmeh. There, in a hilly landscape flecked with olive groves, the recruits were received by a Syrian who runs a jihadi camp and organised into fighting units. Each team was assigned an Arabic speaker and given 10 days’ basic training, the point of which was not to learn how to shoot but to learn to communicate and work together.