Ramadan Death Count: Turkey: 02/05/20

(Bitlis) Two Turkish soldiers were killed during a clash with the  Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the south eastern Turkish province of Bitlis, according to a statement from the Turkish Interior Ministry. Four gendarmes were also injured in the clash.

Ramadan death toll stands at 90

Syria:What does the world do with Hundreds of ISIS brides

(Kurdistan)  With the fall of the last ISIS stronghold inside Syria, hundreds of foreign ISIS brides have been captured by Kurds. The problem is very few of their home countries want anything to do with. The worlds media have descended on one such camp where these women are being kept. Quite a few are unrepentant regards ISIS, how life under Sharia law was wonderful,  and how the keeping of slaves is acceptable. However the majority claim that they didn't know what ISIS was doing, how they were duped and how they (and their husbands) only carried out humanitarian work. That angle is coming up a lot nowadays and unfortunately a lot of do-gooders in the West believe them and are demanding that these poor innocent women be brought home.

One such example is 28 year old 28-year-old Dura Ahmed from Toronto. Who covered from head to toe in  black niqab, told her tale of how she moved over to Syria from Canada four years ago at her husband’s urging.She claimed she knew nothing of ISIS or what was happening inside Syria before she travelled, which is strange seeing as the 2 years before she relocated to Syria, she spent 2 years being taught English and Middle Eastern studies. When asked if she had heard of the countless executions or the murder and enslavement of Yezidi women.

“Briefly, just briefly I heard about some executions taking place,”

As for the Yezidis, she remained non-plussed.

“When I came here I heard. I haven’t seen one but…,” she laughed. “Well, having slaves is part of Sharia [Islamic law]. I believe in Sharia, wherever Sharia is. We must follow whoever is implementing the way, the law.”

Asked if she had any regrets she exclaims she has none.

Ramadan Death Count: Turkey: 14/06/18

(Suruc) Four people are dead and eight wounded in southern Turkey, after election campaigning descended into violence. 

The clash broke out in the mainly Kurdish town of Suruc, when an MP from the ruling AKP, Ibrahim Halil Yildiz, was touring some shops. Currently  there are two different stories doing the rounds:

Turkish version:

Kurdish militant shopkeepers attacked the MP's entourage, and says his brother is among the dead. It says supporters of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) were involved in the bloodshed.

Kurdish version:

The politician's bodyguards opened fire when he received a hostile reception.

Ramadan death toll stands at 1871

Turkey: Excuses its war against the Kurds , by claiming the US was going to use them against Iran.

(Ankara)  The Turks really haven't a leg to stand on for their invasion of Syria in which to remove the Kurds from a land they have lived on for thousands of years. First of all they claimed that the reason they went in was simply that the Kurds living on their own lands were ...terrorists, now after been found lacking on the military front , they have come out with a new excuse. 

Ilnur Cevik a special advisor to the pocket dictator himself claims in the Turkish governments mouth piece that the reason the Turks went in, is so as to save Iran, yup apparently the US were going to use the Kurds minding their own business in their own lands in which to attack Iranian forces inside Syria.  I wonder what excuse Ankara will come out with next week?

Syria: 6 weeks of Operation Olive branch

(Afrin) On the 19 January 2018, Turkish forces invaded Syria with an aim to eradicate the Kurdish enclave centred around the town of Afrin. Turkey the most powerful military power in the region after days of shelling and air strikes followed up with a land invasion. However, very little progress has been made by Turkey which with a standing army of 350K regular soldiers, over 3000 tanks and complete air control resumed that this would be a walk in the park. Find below an info graphic which shows the advances Turkey has made into the Afrin enclave over the past 6 weeks, which to be honest doesn't say much for the military capabilities of the Turkish Army, But then the pocket dictator has purged the armed forces of its most capable leaders and replaced them with political lackeys, which could explain why the Turks deepest advance into the area is around 5kms. Not bad going after 6 weeks. Not.

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#Syria Battle for #Afrin 24.01 - 05.03.2018 pic.twitter.com/tDlAU0lild

— Mark (@markito0171) 5 March 2018

Syria: Pro-Assad forces arrive in Afrin

(Afrin)  Syrian government forces have entered the Kurdish enclave of Afrin, which in turn provoked  an immediate response from Turkish forces besieging the area with an artillery strike.  The convoy of pro-Syrian government fighters in pickup trucks mounted with heavy weapons entered Afrin, where Turkey has been conducting a month-long military operation. Whilst the Kurds have done extremely well in keeping the Turkish advance to under 10km.

Key: Blue= Turkish advance. Dark Green =Turkish proxies. Red= Syrian. Light Green=Kurds. Pink= contested.

After a month of fighting and thus militarily aren’t in acute need of more soldiers, the moral support from Assad and the extra weaponry (As in anti-Aircraft missiles) send a huge  message to Anakara that they may have bitten off more than they can chew here. And let’s be serious, as soon as the Turkish body count starts to climb, Turkish Publish support will waiver.

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Large military convoy of Iran-backed Syrian NDF (Shabiha) units heading from Nuble and Zahra to Afrin to support YPG against TSK/FSA. pic.twitter.com/1G3zxy5huD

— Stork (@NorthernStork) 20 February 2018

Turkey: Tells Syria not to intervene in its battle against the Kurds, inside Syria.

(Ankara)  After it emerged on Monday that pro-Assad militiamen would enter Afrin to assist local Kurdish militias fighting against an incursion by the Turkish military and Syrian rebels affiliated with Ankara. Turkey has warned the Syrian government that it risks a military confrontation with Ankara . Deputy Prime Minister  Bekir Bozdağ said Turkey is following the situation closely and there has been no official confirmation from Damascus over reports on the regime's involvement in Afrin.

"If Assad regime forces enter Afrin it would give a green light to dividing Syria, such a move would cause disaster in the region and would have serious consequences."

The Turkish foreign minister also warned the regime on Monday against entering the Syrian town shortly after Syrian state media  reported that popular forces are to arrive in Afrin area soon to support locals in facing the aggression launched by the Turkish regime on the area since January 20th.

It appears that the Turkish pocket dictator has really set the cat amongst the pigeons. The problem is on the side of the Kurds can be found the Syrians, Russians , the Americans and the Iranians maybe that explains why Erdoğan has been on the phone to both Moscow and Tehran in which to try and save face, as he knows if he drags Turkey into a war with all of the above, his tenure as President for life will end very soon as one thing the Syrians can bring to the table is ground to air missiles and their inclusion will take away the only advantage the Turks have over the Kurds.

Boy and I thought Game of Thrones was complicated.

Syria: Turkish propaganda explains their slow progress against the kurds

(Ankara)  As I mentioned yesterday, despite being much bigger, stronger and better armed, the Turks are finding out the hard way that the Kurds are going to make them pay for every foot of land they take in their mission to remove the Kurds from Northern Syria (Where they have lived for thousands of years)

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Turkish Tanks massacre in #Afrin , literally a MASSACRE. #DefendAfrin pic.twitter.com/r3Fc8fqanl

— azad mourad (@azadmourad1) 11 February 2018

As you can see from the above video clip, the Kurds are hitting back, add the mountainous terrain and the Turkish hopes of a Blitzkrieg have ground down virtually to a halt. Which is why the Turkish Government dragged out Ali Erbaş head of Religious Affairs Directorate to explain why:

“Our Muslims soldiers are undertaking their fight in line with Islam’s principles. That is why they are moving slowly in Afrin. They are moving with the conscience of not causing even one person’s nose to bleed; after all, this is Islam’s order,”

Then he decided to explain the righteousness of the current invasion of Syria by comparing it with the Ottoman Empire which oppressed millions:

“All our conquests in history were undertaken to prevent oppression. Our soldiers fire their bullets against oppressors, to protect those oppressed. Our soldiers are clashing for this, because there are terror organizations there, and they are constantly oppressing,”

Wow looking at the map below the Turks sure went out of their way over the years to root out Terrorists.

Syria: US kill over 100 Syrian regime troops

(Deir ez-Zur) The US Airforce killed at least 100 Syrian regime and allied fighters , destroyed 9 tanks and about 20 technicals in which to stem an attack on their rear.

The airstrikes took place after an attack by around 500 troops backed by tanks and artillery took place on positions held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in Deir Ezzor province in the east of the country.  The positions were 5 miles inside an agreed-upon Euphrates River de-confliction line, so the SDF called in artillery and airstrikes in which to send the message to the Syrians to get back across the river. 1 SDF soldier was hurt in the exchange. What makes this incident and loss of life even more pathetic is that the Kurds are still fighting ISIS in the region as this ISIS video from last week shows:

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#ISIS has published for the first time footage of women, fighting next to IS fighters in eastern #DeirEzzor against Kurdish #SDF pic.twitter.com/kWKm66foyW

— Nidalgazaui (@Nidalgazaui) 7 February 2018

It appears the Syrians wanted to gain a little extra ground whilst the Kurds were concentrating on ISIS. Big mistake.

Syria: Turkish troops torture Old men

(Afrin)  Turkey is banded by the ethical latte drinkers as a country run by moderate Islam. At the moment they are waging a war against the Kurds, in a Kurdish land . This is after they openly supported ISIS. Here is a video clip of Turkish troops using torture on an Old man. The same Turkey which complains about the Israeli army every chance it gets:

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🆘‼😯🔥 Northern #Syria: Turkish soldiers and Syrian #FSA terrorists torture an old Kurdish farmer inside a #Turkish APC. They threaten to break his nose if he does not tell them about anti-tank weapons and #YPG fighters. But the old man says he knows nothing. #Afrin pic.twitter.com/JqEAdmvo9E

— Onlinemagazin (@OnlineMagazin) February 6, 2018

Turkey: State run news agency 'Anadolu' reveals US base locations inside Syria.

(Ankara)  In a move that exemplifies the Islamic penchant for stabbing you in the back. Turkey has made public the location of every US base inside Northern Syria. The bases usually kept secret  in which to ensure they don't warrant the attention of those idiots who simply wish to murder death kill were revealed in the state run 'Anadolu'.  The reason for doing so is no doubt the support the US has been giving the Kurds combat ISIS. Turkey does not support any notion of a Homeland for the Kurds, either in Turkey or elsewhere (Iraq/Iran/Syria)  and no doubt isn't happy how the Kurds have been armed in which to take the fight back to ISIS (Something they have excelled at) .  For the Turks this is a step too far and  so as is the way of the Muslim, they have stabbed the US in the back in which to make a political statement.

The Turks have justified their move by claiming that the US is supporting Terrorists, the irony here is there is valid evidence that Turkey openly supported ISIS. Naturally the Pentagon isn’t happy and has issued a press release:

"The release of sensitive military information exposes Coalition forces to unnecessary risk and has the potential to disrupt ongoing operations to defeat ISIS,"

Levent Tok, an Anadolu Agency reporter on the story, told the Bloomberg news service that the information about U.S. troop positions wasn’t leaked by the Turkish government. He said the story was based on field work by Anadolu’s Syria reporters and some of the details on the bases were disclosed on social media by Kurdish fighters. He finished with:

"The U.S. should have thought about this before it cooperated with a terrorist organization," 

With the Turks, acting the same way towards Germany, Saudi Arabia and the EU. It seems that granting Erdoğan dictator like powers  has resulted in Turkey turning away from common sense politics to those of a rouge nation.

US: Turkish president’s security team attack protesters on the streets of Washington DC

(Washington) The visit of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to the US, drew out a crowd of protesters who object to his style of leadership. However this didn't go down well with his bodyguards who presumed that as they can stamp down hard on anything and everything back in the mother-country, they can do exactly the same elsewhere, which is why they charged the protesters yesterday on the streets of Washington DC and put 9 of them in hospital, 2 of them seriously injured.

It appears the brawl erupted when the Turkish president’s security detail attacked protesters carrying the flag of the Kurdish PYD party outside the Turkish ambassadors residence.

Iraq: Turkish airstrike kills 10 Kurds

(Ankara) The Turks have today revealed that they carried out airstrikes inside Iraq against Kurds who are fighting ISIS. Targeting the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), the Turkish air force hit PKK bases in the Zap and Sinat-Haftanin regions of northern Iraq. Claiming that they have hit terrorist sites, the Turks state they destroyed four shelters, three weapon establishments and 10 people.

Why am I not surprised at how the Turks are targeting one of the most successful groups to have taken on ISIS? The same Turkey, I should add, which goes all cock a hoop when Israel takes out actual terrorists with better targeting and a smaller death toll. But when they do the same, it's move along, there’s nothing to see here.

Air-strikes carried out by Turkey on Kurds fighting ISIS

(Ankara) The twists and turns of the fighting that is taking place across Iraq and Syria took another unscheduled diversion today when Turkey carried out airstrikes on Kurdish  troops fighting ISIS in both Iraq and Syria.

The Turks have excused the airstrikes by claiming to killed 40 terrorists in northern Iraq and 30 terrorists in north-eastern Syria, "within the scope of the international law" in which to prevent the terrorist group from sending terrorists, arms, ammunition, and explosives to Turkey.

Turkey: Suicide bomb attack kills 13 and injures 56

(Kayseri) A bus carrying soldiers to a market was targeted by a suicide bomber, resulting in the deaths of 13 people and injuring 46 others. No group has yet admitted liability, but the Turks have pointed the finger of blame at the Kurds, whilst ignoring the fact that ISIS, which has a fairly strong power base in the region, is currently under attack from the Turks.

Whilst I say attack, the Turks launched their current adventure into Syria in which to try and stop the Eastern and Western Kurdish enclaves from meeting up and thus forming the basis of a future contiguous (Syrian) Kurdistan.

For some strange reason, the Turks have no wish to allow the sizeable Kurdish minority from forming their own state. This is from a country which supports independence abroad for Gaza, Kosovo and 20 years ago Bosnia, but not for people next door to Turkey.

Kurds/Turks/Syrians/ISIS

Syria: 4-Way Battle Ground

(Syria) To the north of Syria, a 4-way battle is currently taking place between Syria, the Kurds, the Turks and ISIS. The Kurds (yellow) would like to unify their respective areas. The Turks and their minions (green) don't want the Kurds to have their own homeland, so they invaded Syria on the pretext of defending Turkey in which to do just that. ISIS, well, they are simply ISIS (black) and are currently on the backfoot and will fight anybody, including themselves. That leaves Syria (reddish orange) which just wants its country back without other state actors having a say on the matter (that said, they have been using the Kurds to do their work for them in the north).

Mind you, the Turkish Pocket Dictator Erdogan...

... has now stated that he sent his troops into Syria in which to topple Assad. Which is strange as he is currently purging the Turkish military of anybody whose face doesn't fit. Moscow has asked the Nazi fan to explain himself:

"It is a very serious statement and one which differs from previous ones and with our understanding of the situation. We hope that our Turkish partners will provide us with some kind of explanation about this."

Syria: Kurds advance on ISIS capital Al Raqqa

(Raqqa) The Kurds are currently advancing on the de-facto ISIS capital 'Raqqa'.

Like their bed fellows in Mosul, ISIS are using VIEDs in which to make the march against them as costly as possible.  Yesterday I posted a couple of clips of successful ISIS attacks against Iraq armour around Mosul. The clip below shows something similar advancing at speed towards the Kurds. You can feel the atmosphere as they target the advancing vehicle and it keeps on coming.

The first missile looks like a Milan, the second one was most likely a Javelin.

Syrian War Report – November 10, 2016: Kurdsh YPG Clashing with Turkey-led Forces

Iraq: The Battle for Mosul (in videos)

(Mosul) Here are a few videos, that I have collated which may help illuminate the battle for Mosul.

Peshmerga fighters dance, celebrate after liberating 8 villages from #IslamicState on first day of #Mosul_Offensive pic.twitter.com/ibsbVnr9kS

— Eliza Mackintosh (@elizamackintosh) 17 October 2016

#BREAKING: #ISIS suicide car bomb detonates next to an #Iraq-i army tank - southeastern #Mosul !
More videos: https://t.co/b1jRtuw46S pic.twitter.com/nJ3ZccGT6M

— Kurdistan24 English (@K24English) 17 October 2016

Dramatic footage shows U.S.-led airstrike on ISIS 'car bomb factory' in Mosul, Iraq. https://t.co/4D8n7DA4KP pic.twitter.com/inZegUBaob

— ABC News (@ABC) 17 October 2016

This is insane. CNN shows suicide bomber blowing himself up during battle for Mosul pic.twitter.com/KLIsK3plBk

— Colin Jones (@colinjones) 17 October 2016

As Iraqi and Kurdish forces move in on #IslamicState, @ramsaysky is with them near #Mosul. Watch his report: https://t.co/gxZIyxNzgR

— Sky News (@SkyNews) 17 October 2016

Iraq: The Battle for Mosul (in pictures)

(Mosul) They say a picture says a thousand words here's a few thousand then:

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters load a multiple rocket launcher

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters fire a multiple rocket launcher from the top of Mount Zardak,

ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh, across the Tigris from Mosul under fire

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters take up position on top of Mount Zardak, about 25 kilometres east of Mosul,

Iraqi forces are pictured cheering as they gather at Qayyarah military base, 

Iraqi forces begin the advance on Mosul

 Iraqi forces gather about 60 kilometres south of Mosul

Iraqi security forces stands guard during preparations to attack Mosul

A Iraqi convoy  leaving Kirkuk  for Mosul, 

A car bomb explosion to the  east of Mosul 

Kurdish Peshmerga 

Kurdish Peshmerga 

A member of the US-led coalition stands guard shortly before the start of the offensive

Kurdish Peshmerga forces  advance on Mosul

Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters hold a position on the top of Mount Zardak

Iraqi forces advance towards Mosul