. To reach Chebaa, IS must cross several Bekaa Valley villages that are mostly Sunni, Christian and Druze. Based on previous experiences in Iraq and Syria, it seems that Sunni villages are not likely to fight the terrorist organizations. The Christian villages are scared and incapable of confronting this terrorism, especially after seeing what befell their counterparts in other countries. Druze villages like Rashaya and Hasbaya will not confront IS either and will fall………
In his latest visit to these regions, Druze leader Walid Jumblatt instructed his fellow Druze to avoid any clash with the displaced Syrians. Then, he appeared on television and declared that he “did not consider Jabhat al-Nusra a terrorist organization.”………
All these tensions are fueled by the speeches of some radical Sunni clerics, who gave legal cover for the cooperation with IS and Jabhat al-Nusra. These clerics also played a major role in the recent defection of some soldiers from the army, most of whom hail from towns in Akkar……
Sheikh Dai al-Islam al-Shahhal, founder of the Salafist movement in Lebanon, is the head of these clerics. This provocative discourse is fueled by the declarations of some northern members of parliament who constantly attack the army. The last straw came when IS’ flag was recently raised in Tripoli……
@ bernard ross:
The Poison Tree
Column: Islamic State and Hamas are branches of single Islamist threat
Seeking sunni arab hegemony from Saudi to the Med
Perhaps their hearts weren’t into bombing their own sunni jihadis 😛
Now I expect more support of syrian kurds from Turkey as turkey supported the Iraqui kurd Barzani with whom they made oil deals in Iraqui Kurdistan