‘Russia and Iran beyond loyal’: Syria’s Assad

On 17 August, for the first time in two years, the UN Security Council, including Russian Federation, agreed to a statement in favour of a push for a political solution. “I’m thinking of Turkey which must get involved in the fight against Daesh (an alternative name for the Islamic State group) and resume the dialogue with the Kurds”, Hollande said.

‘The power of Iran is the power of Syria, and a victory for Syria is a victory for Iran‘.

The conclusion of Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers including the United States has been followed by a spate of high-level diplomatic contacts aimed at trying to advance solutions to the Syrian war.

But interviews with Afghan fighters and relatives of combatants killed in Syria point to a vigorous – and sometimes coerced – recruitment drive of Shiite Hazara refugees by Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards Corps propping up Assad’s floundering regime.

Syria’s conflict began with anti-government demonstrations in March 2011. Assad said there was a difference between foreign fighters among rebel groups and Hezbollah fighters assisting the regime: “The Syrian state requested the assistance of Hezbollah”. One is that it conceded too much in allowing Iran to retain a domestic uranium enrichment program, abandoning past Western demands that Iran have none. “Israel, supporter of the terrorists, occasionally demonstrates courage to attack”.

The civil war is a mixed bag for an Israeli government which long enjoyed an uneasy truce with the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Assad’s comments cast further doubt on a Russian plan to forge an alliance against the group.

Assad admitted last month that a series of battlefield losses, defections and desertions have left Syria’s forces with a serious manpower shortage. Russian Federation said the US should co-operate with Mr Assad to fight the group.

The participation of Afghan militants in Syria war has sparked concerns among the Afghan officials some will return to fight in Afghanistan under Islamic State’s banner.

“What [last week’s attack] tells me is Iran has no intentional of changing its regional behavior”, Herzog said.