Russian Airstrikes in Syria: What’s Really Going On?

In Raqa, where IS militants have carried out a few of the mass beheadings that they infamously use as online propaganda, activists and residents said the group cancelled Friday prayers and emptied mosques there because they feared more Russian strikes.

The United States does not have any intentions to let the Syrian conflict become a proxy war with Russian Federation, US President Barack Obama said during a press conference on Friday.

He suggested that the US would continue to build up Kurdish forces’ capacity in northern Syria to fight against Daesh and also partner with opposition groups that believe Daesh recruitments will increase as long as Assad remains in power.

The Russian Prime Minister added that his country’s air strikes in Syria were not linked to any economic interests.

His comments came as British intelligence forces observed that only one in 20 Russian air strikes were hitting I.S targets, according to Britain’s defence minister.

“Surgical strikes carried out by Su-34 fighter bombers near the town of Raqqa destroyed a command post of the IS gangs”, it said. A few of the groups targeted have been supplied with training and weapons by the United States and its allies.

“I want to understand why Russia is so interested in Syria”, Erdogan said, adding he had “received information” that 65 people had died so far in Russian bombing runs, without specifying the source of the toll.

Moscow starting conducting air strikes on Wednesday, and it insists that it is only targeting IS, with strikes recorded on IS command centres, arms depots and military vehicles.

A member of the coalition’s political committee, Ahmed Ramadan, said that: “Russia is waging its aggression outside the worldwide community, the UN Security Council and the Arab League will by responding to the illegitimate regime’s call for intervention and in contravention of the Geneva statement it had signed which calls for a political solution to the Syrian crisis”.

The Observatory said air raids near Raqqa Thursday killed 12 extremists including a Tunisian and an Iraq. Idlib region is controlled by a coalition of rebel groups that includes the al-Qaida-linked Jabbat al-Nusra.

The Russians are strong supporters of Assad, whose brutal crackdown on peaceful protesters five years ago sparked a civil war that has left 250,000 dead and forced 4 million more to flee the country.

The campaign is the first time Moscow has sent forces into combat beyond the frontiers of the former Soviet Union since the disastrous Afghanistan campaign of the 1980s, a bold move by Putin to extend Russia’s influence beyond its neighbourhood.