United Kingdom: Russian airstrikes in Syria are killing civilians

German chancellor Angela Merkel said that while “military efforts” were needed in Syria, they would not be enough to end the bloodshed.

Summing up the results of Russia’s first three days of strikes, a senior official with the General Staff said Russian jets had made more than 60 sorties over 50 IS targets, adding that Russia plans to ramp up its aerial campaign.

The Syrian government has long referred to the rebels as “terrorists” as well.

The Russian airstrikes that began Wednesday have mainly targeted central and northwestern Syria, strategic regions that are the gateway to President Bashar Assad’s strongholds in the capital, Damascus, and along the Mediterranean coast.

Syria and the U.S.-backed coalition against ISIS also have continued strikes.

Russian unmanned airborne autos go on to track the regions manageable of the Islamic State panel, the announcement said.

Russian air strikes targeting the Islamic State group in Syria have sown “panic”, forcing a few 600 “militants” to abandon their positions and head to Europe, Moscow claims. Last week, Israel’s military hit two Syrian army posts after rockets from Syria landed in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. “Today it entered Syria, so Syria will become a graveyard for invaders,” he said.

Addressing the lower house of Parliament, Interior Minister Milan Chovanec said Thursday: “I am looking with a deep distrust at the Russian military engagement in the area”, adding that airstrikes alone “solve nothing”. They have been joined by Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah militia, known for its well-trained fighters. The group, with hundreds of Western and Arab fighters, has a presence in northern Aleppo province and has been fighting with rebel groups there.

Russian Federation is not deviating from its policy in Syria, but rather reinforcing a strategy that has faced setbacks in recent months due to impressive rebel gains in Idlib, Hama and Homs provinces. It has allied with a myriad of local groups.

The conflict in Syria is a three-way war between the Assad government, rebel forces of varying backgrounds, and ISIS.

Countries which support terrorism can not battle terrorism… that’s the truth of the coalition that we see. “The chances of success for this coalition are great and not insignificant”.

And whatever weaknesses Putin may face, the USA grip on the Middle East has been severely tested-in both military and political terms-since its disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003.

That means most of the genuine combat operations will fall to the dozen Sukhoi Su-24 Fencer bombers and Su-25s.

With the Islamic State apparently lacking any sophisticated air defense weapons, Putin can run his air campaign without risking casualties that could provoke a negative reaction at home.

He also defended cooperating with the Syrian government, asking how it could be left out of such a fight in its own country. All other actors are irrelevant to such negotiation and simply obfuscate the real interests at work. Syria expert Charles Lister estimates there are about 100 armed factions in the country.

“Putin and the Russian military didn’t really want to communicate their intentions to the news organs”, according to Gatov, who says that this accounts for the abrupt 180 in party line swapping.

The much-vaunted Su-34 Fullback bomber is not likely to play a significant role-four aircraft are just not enough. Moscow believes the current situation in Syria and Iraq is an example of controlled chaos wreaked by the West against countries with leaders opposing them.

But echoing concerns from Ankara’s Western allies, he accused Moscow of carrying out air strikes not against IS but against moderate Syrian forces opposed to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.