Al Qaeda Archives

Turkey Supports Syria Al Qaeda By Convoys of Weapon: Russian Gen. Staff

May 30, 2016 by administrator

Russian airstrikes against Turkish convoys carrying stolen oil out of Syria and Iraq have hurt the finances of the terrorists and strained Turkish-Russian relations

By Ian Greenhalgh,

Head of the Russian General Staff Lt. Gen. Sergey Rudskoy has said that the never-ending flow of large trucks from Turkey carrying weapons and ammunition crosses the Turkish-Syrian border to deliver them to Al-Nusra Front Terrorists in Syria.

It is becoming ever more obvious to people around the world that Turkey is largely responsible for the continuing war in Syria – I won’t call it a civil war as it is plainly not that, rather something far more complex and multi-layered with international players directly involved.

Why are people realising that Turkey is upto it’s neck in ISIS? Simple, because they can see from any map of the region that the areas where ISIS is in control are adjoining the Turkish border and that is the only route for supplies and weapons to reach ISIS – through Turkey.

What people are asking is why can’t the US, NATO and Russia get together and act decisively against ISIS and the sundry other terrorist groups in the region? After all, they each have a military presence in the region and have carried out air strikes over Syria; surely the combined firepower and resources of such an alliance would make short work of this bunch of head chopping scum?

Of course, the answer to that is most complex, as is the interlocking web of alliances, both known and secret between various nations and the competing agendas at stake.

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ABNA
Turkey Supports Syria Al Qaeda By Convoys of Weapon: Russian Gen. Staff

Lt. Gen. Sergey Rudskoy said in his press briefing on Friday that weapons and ammunitions are continuously being delivered to the al-Nusra Front terrorists in Syria, allowing them to engage Syrian government forces and hindering the fight against Daesh in the country.

“The never-ending flow of large trucks from Turkey carrying weapons and ammunition crosses the Turkish-Syrian border. This constant feed of live forces and weapons allows terrorists from the Nusra Front to continue their provocative shelling and make advances on Syrian government forces, which diminishes [government military] activity against Islamic State terrorists in other areas,” Rudskoy said during a briefing.

Rudskoy also added that the US has acknowledged that the heaviest fighting is centered around areas where the al-Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front is most active.

“Everyone knows, and our US partners admit that the biggest hot spots of active military operations are those parts of the Syrian Republic where the al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorists from the al-Nusra Front run rampant.”

So far, according to Rudskoy, the US has refused to conduct joint operations against terrorist groups in Syria, which has led to an escalation of the conflict.

The al-Nusra Front terrorist group hampers the ceasefire efforts in northern areas of Syria, the Russian General Staff said Friday.

“It is very clear that the terrorist group Jabhat al-Nusra, active in the regions of Aleppo and Idlib, is the main obstacle to expanding the ceasefire regime to northern areas of Syria,” Sergey Rudskoy, chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the Russian General Staff, said.

Moreover, the Al-Nusra Front has used the ‘period of silence’ to partly restore its combat capability. Rudskoy told reporters.

Earlier, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu offered to conduct joint air strikes against terrorist groups in Syria, but the Pentagon declined the offer. However, The Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry says Moscow hasn’t ruled out a possible joint operation in the future; Sputnik reported.

Source: veteranstoday

Russian airstrike targets al-Qaeda prison in Syria’s Idlib

January 9, 2016 by administrator

Russian servicemen prepare a Sukhoi Su-30SM fighter jet before a departure for a mission at the Hmeimin military base in the Latakia province, in the northwest of Syria, on December 16, 2015. (AFP)

The Russian air force has carried out a strike on an al-Qaeda run prison killing around 60 people in Syria’s northwestern province of Idlib, a UK-based monitoring group says.

According to the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights(SOHR), a jail and a religious court belonging to the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front were hit in the town of Maarat al-Numan on Saturday.

SOHR claims that at least 29 terrorists and 21 civilians were killed as four missiles hit the buildings in the militant-held city.

Russia launched its first airstrikes against the Takfiri terrorists in Syria on September 30 at the request of the Syrian government.

Syrian forces have cut off foreign-backed militants’ key supply routes by taking control of several villages in the northern areas of Latakia Province.

Meanwhile, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported that the villages of Rweiset al-Qamoua, al-Mgheiriyeh, Hawsh al-Mgheiriyeh, Rweiset Bani Jazi and Kedin were liberated.

Syrian forces have been battling militants, particularly Daesh, on different fronts throughout Syria since March 2011, when the foreign-sponsored militancy began. Over 250,000 people have been killed over the past few years of turmoil.

Global research report: Israeli Military Admits to Supporting Al Qaeda and ISIS in Syria

November 6, 2015 by administrator

The Times of Israel reported 3 weeks ago:
Global Research: Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Monday that Israel has been providing aid to Syrian rebels, thus keeping the Druze in Syria out of immediate danger. Israeli officials have previously balked at confirming on the record that the country has been helping forces that are fighting to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad.

“We’ve assisted them under two conditions,” Ya’alon said of the Israeli medical aid to the Syrian rebels, some of whom are presumably fighting with al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad. “That they don’t get too close to the border, and that they don’t touch the Druze.”

Al Nusra is Al Qaeda, and closely affiliated with ISIS. And remember, there have NEVER been any “moderate Syrian rebels” … only Islamic Sunni jihadis.

As Vice President Joseph Biden admitted:

The fact of the matter is . . . there was no moderate middle. . . . [O]ur allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria. . . . They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and . . . thousands of tons of weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad except that the people who were being supplied were Al Nusra and al-Qaeda and the extremist elements of jihadis.

(Leaked NSA documents also show that Israeli special forces assassinated a top Syrian government official.)

Not all Israelis support this effort. For example, Jacky Hugi – an Arab affairs analyst for Israeli army radio – recently wrote:

Israel should back Assad

Anyone who wonders why is invited to look at neighboring Iraq or distant Libya. What’s happening there is likely to happen in Syria after President Bashar al-Assad.

In choosing between one bad thing and another, the balance tips toward the regime. The Israeli security establishment should gradually abandon its emerging alliance with the Syrian rebels …

The survival of the Damascus regime guarantees stability on Israel’s northern border, and it’s a keystone to its national security.

It is a dangerous, irresponsible gamble to choose Assad’s enemies and encourage his collapse — it would be playing with fire. The prominent elements among Israel’s potential future neighbors are mainly Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria, or the Islamic State ….

The original source of this article is Washington’s Blog
Copyright © Washington’s Blog, Washington’s Blog, 2015

Syria-Update: Earlier in the day, the Daily Mail reported that the al-Qaeda leader in Syria has been killed.

October 24, 2015 by administrator

The Syrian army killed the leader of Jabhat al-Nusra (Nusra Front) terrorist group, Egypt-born Abu Sulaiman Masri in Aleppo, a source confirmed to Sputnik Saturday.
According to the source, the terrorist was killed during a fight near the Tal-al-Karsani village outside Aleppo.
The Nusra Front terrorist group is an al-Qaeda affiliate operating in Syria.
DETAILS TO FOLLOW

BREAKING NEWS C.I.A. Funds Found Their Way Into Al Qaeda Coffers

March 14, 2015 by administrator

In the spring of 2010, Afghan officials struck a deal to free an Afghan diplomat held hostage by Al Qaeda. But the price was steep — $5 million — and senior security officials were scrambling to come up with the money.
They first turned to a secret fund that the Central Intelligence Agency bankrolled with monthly cash deliveries to the presidential palace in Kabul, according to several Afghan officials involved in the episode. The Afghan government, they said, had already squirreled away about $1 million from that fund. Report nytimes
Within weeks, that money and $4 million more provided from other countries was handed over to Al Qaeda, replenishing its coffers after a relentless C.I.A. campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan had decimated the militant network’s upper ranks.
The C.I.A.’s contribution to Qaeda’s bottom line was just another in a long list of examples of how the United States, largely because of poor oversight and loose financial controls, has sometimes inadvertently financed the very militants it is fighting.
While refusing to pay ransoms for Americans kidnapped by Al Qaeda, the Taliban or, more recently, the Islamic State, the United States has spent hundreds of billions of dollars over the last decade at war in Iraq and Afghanistan, some of which has been siphoned off to enemy fighters.

READ MORE »

Photos prove cooperation between Israel and al-Nusra Report,

March 5, 2015 by administrator

The undated photo obtained by Press TV shows Israeli soldiers speaking face-to-face with foreign-backed militants near the Israeli occupied Golan heights in Syria.

Press TV has obtained photos showing al-Qaeda-linked militants next to Israeli soldiers in the occupied Golan Heights.

New photos from the Golan Heights further prove Tel Aviv’s support for al-Qaeda-linked militants, especially al-Nusra Front, that have been wreaking havoc in Syria.

The photos obtained by Press TV show Takfiri militants from the terrorist al-Nusra Front next to Israeli soldiers.

Israel is known to have been providing medical, intelligence and military support for militants fighting to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. A number of militant commanders wounded in government attacks on terrorist have reportedly been hospitalized in the occupied territories.

The images obtained by Press TV shows Israeli soldiers speaking face-to-face with militants in Golan.
Cooperation aimed at targeting resistance

The Israeli military’s close cooperation with the militants also assisted the regime’s bombing of a convoy belonging to Lebanese resistance group Hezbollah on January 17. The attack led to the killing of six Hezbollah members as well as an Iranian general. Hezbollah later announced that the attack was coordinated between Tel Aviv and the al-Nusra militants.

“The assault has revealed the degree of cooperation between Takfiris and Israel,” Sheikh Naim Qassem, Hezbollah deputy leader, said during a ceremony seven days after the Israeli attack in Qunaitra, an area close to the Syrian Israeli border.

Late last year, a UN report confirmed contact between militants in Syria and the Israeli army across the Golan cease-fire line, especially during heavy clashes between the terrorists and the Syrian troops.

The report also confirmed that militants had been taking their wounded comrades into the Israeli-occupied part of the Golan Heights for treatment. The UN also confirmed the delivery of boxes by the Israeli army to militants on the Syrian side of the ceasefire line.

Turkish Journalist EMRE USLU: #Turkey Do not lend support to al-Qaeda

February 28, 2015 by administrator

EMRE USLU Turkish Journalist

By EMRE USLU –

Message to #Turkey Do not lend support to al-Qaeda

Do you think Western countries are stupid?

No one but your trolls accepts this Eastern guile. Are Westerners stupid and silly? Do you think Germany, which acknowledged it had wiretapped your communication, does not know what you are up to? Do you think the United Nations, which examined arm shipments and drafted a report about it, does not know what you are doing? Former US Ambassador to Turkey Francis J. Ricciardone openly said: “The [Turkish] government was supporting al-Nusra. We warned, but they didn’t take heed. They continued to work with al-Nusra.” The US already knows what you are doing, so they don’t need the perception-engineering efforts of mine as you claimed. In the White House, US President Barack Obama once accused Turkey of backing al-Qaeda.

Dutch opposition says has documents proving Turkey sent arms to Syrian jihadists

January 19, 2015 by administrator

The Dutch opposition Christian Democratic Party (CDA) announced that it has confidential documents proving that Turkey had sent weapons to al-Qaeda militants in Syria and that it conveyed the documents to the Dutch government, according to a BBC Turkish report published on Sunday.

CDA deputy Pieter Omtzigt said his party acquired the confidential documents in November and shared them with Dick Schoof, the National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism (NCTV). According to the report, the documents are duplicates from an ongoing criminal investigation in Turkey into the 2014 interception and search on three Syria-bound trucks that belonged to the National Intelligence Organization (MİT).

Turkish gendarmes and several prosecutors are accused of unlawfully intercepting and conducting search on the MİT trucks, which, according to media claims, transported arms to radical Islamists in Syria.

The BBC Turkish report said former Adana Governor Hüseyin Avni Coş, who was in office at the time of the interception of the MİT trucks, said in a testimony that the arms-filled trucks belonged to MİT and were being sent to Syria upon orders from then-Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Omtzigt asked Dutch Minister of Security and Justice Ivo Opstelten whether he conveyed the documents to Foreign Minister Bert Koenders ahead of his recent visit to Turkey. Koenders visited Turkey on Jan. 5-7.

Meanwhile, CDA deputy Raymond Knops, a member of the Dutch Parliament Foreign Affairs Contact Group, accused the Dutch government of “playing ostrich” regarding Turkey’s relations with terrorist groups in Syria. Knops submitted a parliamentary question addressing Koenders regarding the claims of Turkey aiding al-Qaeda in Syria with weapons and ammunition. In his parliamentary question, Koenders cited the report by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team.

Koenders stated that the UNSC report had highlighted that the weapons and ammunition held by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the al-Nusra Front were largely transported via Turkey through secret ways. According to Koenders, this information has also been confirmed by the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI).

The Dutch lawmaker asked, “Do you find it disturbing that weapons and ammunition have been sent to terrorist organizations in Syria through the land of NATO member Turkey?” Koenders described launching air strikes on ISIL while Syrian jihadists receive arms via Turkey as “mopping the floor while the faucet remains open.”

Last Thursday, five Turkish prosecutors who investigated the claims of illegal arms shipments to opposition groups in Syria by the MİT trucks were suspended by a top judicial board.

The suspension of the prosecutors came a day after the government obtained a blanket gag order from Adana Fifth Criminal Court of Peace, preventing the Turkish media from reporting on documents that were leaked on Twitter on Jan. 12 by anonymous Twitter user @LazepeM, who claimed the information came from the General Staff and gendarmerie investigations.

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Turkey’s intelligence service (MIT) shipped weapons to al-Qaeda, military says

January 15, 2015 by administrator

Secret official documents about the searching of three trucks belonging to Turkey’s national intelligence service (MIT) have been leaked online, once again corroborating suspicions that Ankara has not been playing a clean game in Syria. According to the authenticated documents, the trucks were found to be transporting missiles, mortars and anti-aircraft ammunition. The Gendarmerie General Command, which authored the reports, alleged, “The trucks were carrying weapons and supplies to the al-Qaeda terror organization.” But Turkish readers could not see the documents in the news bulletins and newspapers that shared them, because the government immediately obtained a court injunction banning all reporting about the affair.

When President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was prime minister, he had said, “You cannot stop the MIT truck. You cannot search it. You don’t have the authority. These trucks were taking humanitarian assistance to Turkmens.”

Since then, Erdogan and his hand-picked new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu have repeated at every opportunity that the trucks were carrying assistance to Turkmens. Public prosecutor Aziz Takci, who had ordered the trucks to be searched, was removed from his post and 13 soldiers involved in the search were taken to court on charges of espionage. Their indictments call for prison terms of up to 20 years.

In scores of documents leaked by a group of hackers, the Gendarmerie Command notes that rocket warheads were found in the trucks’ cargo.

According to the documents that circulated on the Internet before the ban came into effect, this was the summary of the incident:

-On Jan. 19, 2014, after receiving a tip that three trucks were carrying weapons and explosives to al-Qaeda in Syria, the Adana Provincial Gendarmerie Command obtained search warrants.

-The Adana prosecutor called for the search and seizure of all evidence.

-Security forces stropped the trucks at the Ceyhan toll gates, where MIT personnel tried to prevent the search.-While the trucks were being escorted to Seyhan Gendarmerie Command for an extensive search, MIT personnel accompanying the trucks in an Audi vehicle blocked the road to stop the trucks. When MIT personnel seized the keys from the trucks’ ignitions, an altercation ensued. MIT personnel instructed the truck drivers to pretend their trucks had malfunctioned and committed physical violence against gendarmerie personnel.-The search was carried out and videotaped despite the efforts of the governor and MIT personnel to prevent it.

-Six metallic containers were found in the three trucks. In the first container, 25-30 missiles or rockets and 10-15 crates loaded with ammunition were found. In the second container, 20-25 missiles or rockets, 20-25 crates of mortar ammunition and Douchka anti-aircraft ammunition in five or six sacks were discovered. The boxes had markings in the Cyrillic alphabet.

-It was noted that the MIT personnel swore at the prosecutor and denigrated the gendarmerie soldiers doing the search, saying, “Look at those idiots. They are looking for ammunition with picks and shovels. Let someone who knows how to do it. Trucks are full of bombs that might explode.”

-The governor of Adana Huseyin Avni Cos arrived at the scene and declared, “The trucks are moving with the prime minister’s orders” and vowed not to let them be interfered with no matter what.

-With a letter of guarantee sent by the regional director of MIT, co-signed by the governor, the trucks were handed back to MIT.

-Driver Murat Kislakci said in his deposition, “This cargo was loaded into our trucks from a foreign airplane at Ankara Esenboga Airport. We are taking them to Reyhanli [on the Syrian border]. Two men [MIT personnel] in the Audi are accompanying us. At Reyhanli, we hand over the trucks to two people in the Audi. They check us into a hotel. The trucks move to cross the border. We carried similar loads several times before. We were working for the state. In Ankara, we were leaving our trucks at an MIT location. They used to tell us to come back at 7 a.m. I know the cargo belongs to MIT. We were at ease; this was an affair of state. This was the first time we collected cargo from the airport and for the first time we were allowed to stand by our trucks during the loading.”

-After accusations of espionage by the government and pro-government media, the chief of general staff ordered the military prosecutor to investigate,. On July 21, the military prosecutor declared the operation was not espionage. The same prosecutor said this incident was a military affair and should be investigated not by the public prosecutor, but the military. The civilian court did not retract its decision.

The government cover-up

Though the scandal is tearing the country apart, the government opted for its favorite tactic of covering it up. A court in Adana banned written, visual and Internet media outlets from any reporting and commenting on the stopping of the trucks and the search. All online content about the incident has been deleted.

The court case against the 13 gendarmerie elements accused of espionage has also been controversial. The public prosecutor, who in his indictment said the accused were involved in a plot to have Turkey tried at International Criminal Court, veered off course. Without citing any evidence, the indictment charged that there was collusion between the Syrian government, al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS). The prosecutor deviated from the case at hand and charged that the killing by IS of three people at Nigde last year was actually carried out by the Syrian state.

At the moment, a total blackout prevails over revelations, which are bound to have serious international repercussions.

Fehim Taştekin is a columnist and chief editor of foreign news at the Turkish newspaper Radikal, based in Istanbul.

Turkey’s dirty secret about al-Qaeda

January 14, 2015 by administrator

By: EMRE USLU,

Since 2012, political observers has been questioning Turkey’s relationship with al-Qaeda and other radical Islamist terrorist organizations.

Three interesting developments related to this took place in last 10 days. First, a suicide bomber attacked the İstanbul police. It was revealed that the suicide attacker came from Russia and is affiliated with an Islamic terrorist organization. Interestingly enough, the Turkish police, for the first time in its history, did not reveal the name of the terrorist organization. Three people were arrested for their connection to the attack, but no one knows who they are and what terrorist organizations they belong to.

Those who know how the police work and how counter-terrorism operations are conducted easily noticed that a suicide attack is not a typical terrorist attack. If it was a typical terrorist attack, police would have revealed the name of the organization, shared further evidence, etc. Instead of revealing the truth behind the attack, the police tried to cover up the real story behind the attack.

More importantly, the Turkish media, too, ignored the attack and acts as if no attack took place in İstanbul. We all know from the Uludere incident in which 34 Kurdish villagers were killed by Turkish warplanes, when the Turkish media ignores a terror-related incident, one needs to know Ankara doesn’t want them to investigate the incident.

All in all, the suicide attack in İstanbul seems to be related to the Turkish intelligence community, not to a typical terrorist attack.

Secondly, an anonymous Twitter user claiming to be part of a leftist group shared some documents about Turkey’s assistance to al-Qaeda. The documents indicate that Turkey was transferring weapons to al-Qaeda organizations inside Syria. The documents show that the trucks stopped by gendarmes were full of Russian weapons and heading to al-Qaeda militants inside Syria.

Soon after the documents were leaked on Twitter, Turkish authorities stepped up and got court orders to shut down Twitter and other websites that posted the documents. Such attempts indicate that the documents showed the dirty secret of the Turkish government and made it unhappy.

The weapon transfer to al-Qaeda was much-debated by the Turkish public but for the first time documents prove the allegations about these bizarre relations. Turkish authorities, instead of denying the allegations and proving that they did not help al-Qaeda, tried to cover up the story by attempting to shut down Twitter and other websites that published the document.

Third and more importantly, a witness revealing the dirty secrets of Turkey came out this week. Onder Sığırcıklıoğlu, a former National Intelligence Organization (MİT) agent who was assigned to coordinate anti-Assad activities in Hatay, spoke out about his activities. While working for MİT, Sığırcıklıoğlu organized the handing over of the Syrian colonel Huseyin Hormoush to Assad’s forces.

Sığırcıklıoğlu claims that he has witnessed many illegal activates, including helping illegal groups, transferring arms from Libya to al-Qaeda and bringing jihadists from abroad to Syria.

It is interesting to note that UN inspectors were investigating allegations that the Turkish state was transferring arms from Libya to al-Qaeda; now a former MİT agent speaks out about it.

The documents that show that the Russian weapon systems being transferred into Syria must be related to those weapons brought from Libya.

Seeing all three incidents in the same week is unusual. It seems that there is a serious battle going on behind the curtain; certainly one side of the battle is Turkish intelligence community, but we don’t know the other side.

It could be a sign of rivalry within the state apparatus as well as rivalry between Turkey and other countries.

No matter what the real reason is, revealing Turkey’s dirty secret about al-Qaeda the week of the terrorist attacks in Paris shows that Turkey will face a difficult time for its support to al-Qaeda.