BEIRUT: As US-allied fighters hurtle down the eastern bank of the Euphrates River, a showdown could ensue between the US and Russia, whose allies are racing to take over the same strategic oil-rich territory from Daesh.
While the two sides will likely avoid a direct confrontation, the capture of Raqqa by the US-backed forces, followed by their swift seizure of Syria’s largest oil field from Daesh, has irked Damascus, which needs the oil to boost its flagging economy.
As the rival international coalitions compete to defeat the militants and snap up oil and gas fields, the Russian military has issued a stream of angry statements, accusing the US of colluding with the Daesh and other extremist groups in a bid to stymie the government’s advances.
Both the US and Russia have embedded special forces with their respective partners and are supporting their advances with aggressive airstrikes. They have so far avoided any significant confrontations by maintaining talks and a hotline intended to prevent midair and ground incidents.
US Army Col. Ryan Dillon, spokesman for the US-led anti-Daesh coalition, said contacts with Russia were continuing to avoid friction on the ground around Syria’s Al-Omar oil field, which was seized by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Sunday. But he indicated the coalition was prepared for any possibility.
“We are prepared to defend our partners if they are attacked, whether by ISIS (Daesh) fighters or by anyone else. We certainly don’t want to come to that and we will continue to de-conflict with our Russian partners,” he told the AP on Tuesday. He suggested the SDF would continue to march south into the town of Boukamal on the Iraqi border after consolidating their gains, fueling concerns of conflict between the two groups and their superpower sponsors.
The stakes are high and the two sides have exchanged accusations of firing on one another in the past.
As Daesh sheds its hold on territory, Iranian- and Russia-backed Syrian government forces have been gaining ground on the western bank of the Euphrates River, while the US-backed SDF is advancing on the eastern bank and has already seized a major natural gas field and other smaller oil fields in addition to Al-Omar.
The Al-Omar field, which before the war produced around 9,000 barrels per day (bpd), is a major prize for both sides, particularly the Syrian regime whose coffers have been decimated by the country’s war, now in its seventh year.
The regime and the Kurds have maintained a complicated relationship throughout Syria’s war, mostly refraining from fighting one another while some rebels have accused the Kurds of being secretly aligned with the Syrian president. But US support in the fight against Daesh has emboldened Syria’s Kurds, who now control nearly 25 percent of Syrian territory and have expanded into non-Kurdish, Arab-dominated areas, unsettling Damascus.
Their capture of Raqqa, the former heart of Daesh’s so-called caliphate, was a highly prestigious win and has further raised their profile. Syrian state-run media ignored reports about the US-backed force’s capture of Raqqa for days, and it is not clear how regime troops will respond to their seizure of the Al-Omar field.
Both sides have upped the rhetoric, and have started talking about a possible confrontation.
Some have suggested the SDF now has enough cards to bargain with the Syrian regime in future negotiations.
“I do expect the Assad regime will pressure the SDF to relinquish control of the oil field in return for some form of financial or energy support from the regime,” said Jennifer Cafarella, lead researcher at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War. She said Russia, Iran, and Assad were likely preparing to cut a strategic deal with the main Kurdish militia for the future governance of eastern Syria.
“Russia and Assad could actually demand limits on the US presence in eastern Syria as a condition of a deal,” she said.
Hassan Hassan, a Syria expert who co-authored a book about Daesh, said he did not think there would be a showdown.
“We assume the SDF will continue to control the oil field and surrounding areas if Russia sticks to the de-confliction understanding with Washington, which stipulates that they avoid attacking the other side in a certain area once the other side expels Daesh from it,” he said.
“The regime would have wanted to control the oilfields, but the SDF checkmated it,” he added.
Potential US-Russia showdown in Syria over Daesh-held territory
Potential US-Russia showdown in Syria over Daesh-held territory
Can US-Iran nuclear diplomacy still work after strikes?
- Trump tells NATO summit US strikes ‘obliterated’ nuclear sites, says ‘we’re going to talk’ with Iran next week, may sign an agreement
- Analysts say inconclusive strikes may push parties back to the negotiating table — only this time including regional powers
LONDON: Speaking at the NATO summit in The Hague on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump indicated that the door is open to diplomacy with Iran, just days after he ordered B-2 bombers to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.
Trump once more hailed what he calls the “massive, precision strike” on three of Iran’s nuclear sites, Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan, on June 22, adding that “no other military on Earth could have done it.”
His comments followed claims in a leaked assessment by the US Defense Intelligence Agency suggesting the US strikes had failed to destroy Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium or its centrifuges — succeeding only in setting back the program mere months.
In response to the leaked report, Trump doubled down on earlier statements that Tehran’s nuclear program had been “obliterated.” He went on to say “we’re going to talk” with Iran next week, adding they may sign an agreement.
Asked if Washington is planning to lift sanctions on Iran, Trump said the Iranians “just had a war” and they “fought it bravely,” adding that China can buy oil from Iran if it wants, as the country will “need money to get back into shape.”
Whether Trump’s comments are a sign that the US intends to draft a new nuclear deal with Iran remains to be seen. What such a deal might look like in the wake of the past fortnight’s events is also anyone’s guess. One thing that is clear is that diplomacy seems the only viable option.
It was almost 10 years ago, on July 14, 2015, that representatives of the US, China, France, Germany, Russia, the UK, EU and Iran gathered in Vienna to finalize the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, better known simply as the Iran nuclear deal.
In exchange for sanctions relief, among other things, Iran agreed to limit enrichment of a reduced stockpile of 300 kg of uranium to 3.7 percent — insufficient to produce a bomb but aligned with its claims that its nuclear program was designed solely for generating electricity.
The architect of the deal, which was several years in the making, was US President Barack Obama, who said “principled diplomacy and … America’s willingness to engage directly with Iran opened the door to talks.”
Within three years, the deal was in ruins, undone by Obama’s successor, Donald Trump.
According to inspectors from the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, Iran had been sticking to its side of the bargain. But on May 8, 2018, during his first term as president, Trump unilaterally terminated America’s participation in the JCPOA and reimposed sanctions.
Iran, he said, had “negotiated the JCPOA in bad faith, and the deal gave the Iranian regime too much in exchange for too little.”
This week, in the wake of Israel’s surprise attack targeting the heart of Iran’s nuclear program — and Trump’s equally surprise decision to join in — the prospect of reviving any kind of deal with Tehran might seem distant, at best.
But some analysts believe that a new nuclear rapprochement between the US and Iran could be closer than ever — and not only despite the clashes of the past two weeks, but perhaps because of them.
Ibrahim Al-Marashi, associate professor in the Department of History at California State University San Marcos, said there was no doubt that “among the Iranian public, previously ambivalent about the nuclear issue, the optics of being bombed for programs still under IAEA inspection may rally new domestic support for pursuing a deterrent.”
Furthermore, the attacks by Israel and the US have also “degraded the credibility of international institutions such as the IAEA.
“When countries that comply with inspections and international law are attacked anyway, it undermines the incentive structure that sustains the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons regime, NPT, which Iran ratified in 1970, and the Islamic Republic of Iran endorsed in 1996.
“Why sign treaties or allow inspectors in if they do not shield you from military coercion? This is a dangerous message.”
But, he added, “diplomatic alternatives were, and still are, available” and, for all its flaws, the JCPOA model is not a bad one to consider.
“The 2015 deal, although imperfect, successfully rolled back large portions of Iran’s nuclear program and subjected it to the most intrusive inspection regime in the world,” he said.
“Its collapse was not inevitable; it was a political choice, dismantled by unilateral US withdrawal. Efforts to revive the deal have sputtered, and with the bombs falling the path back to diplomacy looked more distant than ever.
“But it is the only path that has worked before — and the only one likely to work again.”
But only with key adjustments.
As Saudi Arabia and other members of the GCC argued at the time, the JCPOA — put together in great secrecy and without consulting the Gulf states — was insufficiently tough and always doomed to fail.
Now experts argue that a return to diplomacy is not only vital for the stability of the region but that any new nuclear deal must be framed with the direct input of those states most exposed to the consequences of diplomatic failure: the Arab Gulf states.
“All that is true,” said Sir John Jenkins, former UK ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Syria.
“The core point is that the JCPOA bought us between 10 and 15 years, depending on the issue and the associated sunset clause. That was designed to provide time for a new regime to be put in place to contain and deter Iran after the JCPOA expired — which would now only be five years away.
“But the Obama administration, followed by the E3 (the security coalition of the UK, Germany and France), seemed to think that once it had been signed it was such a wonderful achievement that they could turn to other things entirely. That was a mistake.
“This time it needs to be different. And there is an opportunity to start constructing a new security order in the region which involves regional states from the moment of creation rather than as some afterthought.”
Jim Walsh, senior researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Security Studies Program, is adamant that when Trump pulled the plug in 2018, “the JCPOA was already working.
“Every intelligence agency said that Iran was in compliance with the agreement and I defy you to find one serious entity that was charging that Iran was in violation of the JCPOA in the three years from 2015 to 2018.
“They even hung on to their end of the bargain after Trump pulled out, for a solid year, until it was politically untenable.”
The IAEA had large teams of inspectors on the ground, Iran had agreed to requirements that no country had ever agreed to before, “and this was consistent with what people in my trade would call a capability or latency decision.”
This meant “you have the option so that you can move in that direction if you need to, but you do not cross the line because the costs of crossing it are higher than the benefits.”
And, he says, despite all that has happened since, especially in the past fortnight, Iran is fundamentally in the same place today — ready to deal.
“What is Iran’s leverage here in negotiations with the IAEA or with the Europeans or with the Americans? It’s that they can turn the dial up on enrichment and turn it down, and they can install advanced centrifuges and then take them apart.
“This is part of a political game, because they don’t have a lot of ways to put leverage on their opponents.”
He believes that if Iran really wanted an actual bomb, rather than the threat of one as a bargaining chip, it would have had one by now.
“Producing highly enriched uranium is the technically hardest part of the project, and moving to weaponization is more of an engineering problem.” The fact that Iran has not done so is the real clue to the way ahead.
“I’ve worked for 20 years to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, but it would be hard to argue that they don’t have some justification. Let’s be super clear: the country that’s attacking them, Israel, is a nuclear state.
“But if they wanted to build a bomb, they’ve had 18 years to do so, so someone has to explain to me why that hasn’t happened.
“As far back as 2007 the director of US national intelligence said Iran had the technical wherewithal to build a weapon, and the only remaining obstacle was the political will to do so.”
And, despite Trump’s claim that the US attacks had “obliterated” the Iranian nuclear program, political will may still be all that is preventing Iran becoming a nuclear state.
Dan Sagir, an Israeli researcher and lecturer on the topic of Israel’s own nuclear deterrence and its impact on the Arab-Israeli conflict in the Middle East, says that if the US and Iran do return to the talks that were already underway when Israel launched “Operation Rising Lion” on June 12, “any deal that emerges is not going to be as solid as the previous one.”
“So Trump bombed Fordow,” said Sagir. “But where is the 400 kg of highly enriched uranium? The Iranians, who are very talented in this field, will say, ‘You bombed it. You buried it.’ But do we know that’s correct? We’ll never know.
“If they still have it, they can get the bomb within a year. If they don’t have it, it’s two-and-a-half years. In any case, the game is not over.”
In fact, said Walsh of MIT, there is “every indication” that the uranium, which the IAEA says has been enriched to a near-weapons-grade 60 percent — a claim dismissed by Iran as based on “forged documents provided by the Zionist regime” — is not buried within the Fordow complex.
“In May, Iran’s foreign minister warned the IAEA that they would take precautions. On June 13, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization also said they were going to take action, and on that day, according to satellite imagery, a convoy of trucks was outside Fordow, and the next day they were gone.
“So I would guess that they still have a lot of nuclear material somewhere that they could very quickly upgrade to weapons-grade material (which requires 90 percent enrichment).”
Whether or not the current fragile ceasefire between Israel and Iran lasts, details emerging of America’s attack on Fordow and the other Iranian nuclear facilities appear only to reinforce the conclusion that a new nuclear deal with Iran is the only way forward.
“You cannot bomb the knowledge of how to build a centrifuge out of the heads of the Iranians,” said Walsh. “You can’t bomb away 18 years of experience.
“This is a big, mature program and dropping a few bombs isn’t going to change that. You can blow up equipment, and kill scientists, but we’re not talking about Robert Oppenheimer (the US physicist who led the team that made the first atomic bomb) in 1945.
“They’ve been at this for 18 years and now we’re at the management phase, not at the invention stage. They’re going to be able to reconstitute that program if they want to. There is no military solution to this problem.”
Security Council hears of record violations against kids in conflicts, as UN report sparks outcry over Gaza
- Abuses span 25 countries and include killings, maiming, recruitment, abductions, sexual violence, attacks on schools and hospitals, denial of humanitarian aid
- Israel guilty of most violations by a single country: 2,000 children verified killed or maimed in 2024; UNICEF reports more 50,000 children killed, injured or maimed since Oct. 7, 2023
- Algerian envoy slams report author over ‘insufficient public engagement’ given scale of Gaza tragedy; US envoy says report does not do enough to highlight Hamas crimes
NEW YORK CITY: The UN Security Council convened on Wednesday to address what officials described as an unprecedented surge in grave violations against children during armed conflicts around the world.
It followed the publication of a devastating annual report by the secretary-general’s special representative for children and armed conflict, Virginia Gamba. It documented 41,370 grave violations during 2024, a 25 percent increase compared with the previous year, and the highest number since the UN’s Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism was established in 2005.
Verified abuses of children spanned 25 countries and included killings, maiming, recruitment, abductions, sexual violence, attacks on schools and hospitals, and denial of access to humanitarian assistance.
“This year marked a devastating new record,” Gamba told council members. “Behind these numbers are the shattered stories, dreams and futures of over 22,000 children.”
She cited a sharp increase in “compounded violations,” in which children were abducted, recruited and sexually abused, often simultaneously, in the context of deteriorating humanitarian crises.
Israel was responsible for the highest number of violations by a single country against children in 2024, the report found. Gamba’s office was able to verify more than 2,000 children killed or maimed; more than 500 attacks on schools and 148 on hospitals; and over 5,000 incidents in which humanitarian access was denied, including 2,263 in Gaza alone.
Algeria’s ambassador to the UN, Amar Bendjama, delivered a pointed rebuke of what he described as “insufficient public engagement” by the special representative’s office, noting that Gamba had made only two public statements on Gaza during 2024, despite the staggering toll of the conflict there on children.
“How can we ignore the 7,188 verified grave violations attributed to Israeli forces?” Bendjama asked. “This is a man-made crisis … The children of Gaza deserve immediate, effective protection and accountability for those perpetrating these abhorrent violations.”
He also underscored the fact that the statistics in the report reflected only verified violations and added: “For sure, the reality is far worse.
“The (special representative’s) statements fall critically short of the decisive and sustained condemnation warranted by the immense scale of the crisis. This limited public engagement starkly contrasts with the rapidly deteriorating reality on the ground, where children’s right to life is denied every single moment in Gaza.”
He then presented to council members the numbers of incidents reported by international humanitarian organizations, including UNICEF, which is operating on the ground in Gaza and has reported more than 50,000 children killed or injured since the war between Israel and Hamas began in late 2023.
As of May this year, 5,000 children between the ages of 6 months and 5 years old had been diagnosed with acute malnutrition, he said, nearly double the total number reported the previous month. About half of the 1.9 million people internally displaced within Gaza are children, who are living amid the widespread destruction of water, sanitation and healthcare infrastructure.
“How can we ignore these figures? How can we ignore these children?” Bendjama asked.
Stephane Dujarric, the spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said that Guterres fully supports Gamba’s work, adding: “The report is done under a very specific methodology of verification, and we are very clear in the report that this is the tip of the iceberg.
“(Gamba’s) report is done according to a methodology which is given to her through her mandate by the Security Council, which is extremely specific. And I think the report itself is extremely clear in saying these are only the cases they have been able to verify in what is an ongoing conflict, and also being very clear by the fact that this only represents, very likely, a fraction of the children who’ve been killed or maimed.”
Asked by Arab News about the value of a report when the monitoring system on which it is based is admittedly very flawed, and whether it might be time to update the mechanisms, Dujarric said: “I will leave it to the wisdom of the Security Council members to decide whether or not to change the mandate they have given the secretary-general in creating that office many years ago.
“I think we’ve all said that the system could be perfected. At minimum, it ensures that the plight of children who are suffering on the front lines of armed conflict is not forgotten.”
Dorothy Shea, the US charge d’affaires to the UN, defended Israel over its military operations in Gaza and placed the blame for the ongoing conflict squarely on Hamas. She emphasized Israel’s right to self-defense, and told fellow council members that the country had “taken numerous measures to limit harm to civilians and address humanitarian needs.”
She added: “The loss of civilian life in Gaza is tragic. But the responsibility for this conflict rests with Hamas, which could stop the fighting today by freeing the hostages and agreeing to the ceasefire terms already accepted by Israel.”
Shea cited the attacks by Hamas against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, that killed 1,200 people, including 40 children, and in particular highlighted the deaths of Ariel and Kfir Bibas, Israeli siblings who were 4 years old and 9 months old, respectively.
“Hamas murdered the Bibas children and then paraded their coffins through the streets,” she said. “This terrorist organization continues to use civilians, including children, as human shields and refuses to accept a ceasefire that would bring calm to Gaza.”
Shea also accused Hamas of obstructing deliveries of aid and targeting humanitarian workers. “On June 11, Hamas murdered eight innocent Palestinians working on behalf of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation,” she told the council.
The US envoy expressed disappointment that the latest report did not sufficiently highlight what she described as the “full scale” of abuses by Hamas and added: “We strongly condemn Hamas’ actions.”
UNICEF’s director of child protection, Sheema Sen Gupta, told council members that “the world is failing to protect children from the horrors of war.”
In 2024, more than 11,900 children were killed or maimed worldwide, she said, with explosive weapons in populated areas cited as the leading cause of deaths and injuries. She described this as a “systemic failure,” and the use of such weapons as “a death sentence waiting to be triggered.”
Sen Gupta also highlighted a 35 percent increase in sexual violence against children, a form of abuse that remains severely underreported because of stigma and fear.
“These are not just grave violations in technical terms,” she said. “These are acts of brutality that destroy lives.”
Conflict zones such as Somalia, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Haiti were highlighted as major hot spots for violations of children’s rights.
In Congo alone, nearly 10,000 rapes were reported in the first two months of 2025, 40 percent of which involved children. In Haiti, where gangs control vast areas, there has been a dramatic surge in gang rapes and child abductions.
Both Gamba and Sen Gupta emphasized the fact that many of the violations stem from the deliberate targeting of civilians, disregard for ceasefire agreements, and the systematic undermining of humanitarian access. The secretary-general’s report also underscored the continuing sense of impunity that perpetrators enjoy.
However, the officials pointed to some progress. In 2024, for example, more than 16,000 children formerly associated with military forces and other armed groups were released and received reintegration support.
Agreements were also reached with armed forces in Syria, Colombia, the Central African Republic and Haiti, with commitments made to end the recruitment of children and protect civilian infrastructure.
“These examples remind us that where there is political will, progress is possible,” said Sen Gupta.
The UN officials called for urgent measures to address the problems, including: an end to the use of explosive weapons in populated areas; protection of aid workers and humanitarian access; engagement with nonstate armed groups to implement action plans; funding for reintegration and mental health services to help affected children; and the enforcement of international humanitarian law and accountability for violators.
Gamba urged all states to ensure that any political, financial or military support provided to parties involved in conflicts comes with explicit conditions regarding the protection of children.
“Children are not soldiers, they are not collateral damage, they are not bargaining chips,” Sen Gupta said. “They are children and they deserve justice, safety and a future.”
Palestinians say teenager, three others killed in West Bank
- The Ramallah-based health ministry said: “The child Rayan Tamer Houshiyeh was killed after being shot in the neck by soldiers” in Al-Yamoun
- The ministry later said three people died in the village of Kafr Malik
JERUSALEM: The Palestinian health ministry said four people were killed in two separate incidents in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, including a 15-year-old boy who it said was shot by Israeli troops.
It said the teenager was killed in the northern West Bank town of Al-Yamoun, while three other unnamed people died in a separate clash in the southern village of Kafr Malik.
The Israeli military (IDF) said it opened fire after intervening in a clash between Israelis and Palestinians in Kafr Malik. It told AFP that it was “looking into” the events in Al-Yamoun.
The Ramallah-based health ministry said in a statement: “The child Rayan Tamer Houshiyeh was killed after being shot in the neck by soldiers” in Al-Yamoun, northwest of Jenin.
Earlier Wednesday, the Palestinian Red Crescent said that its teams had handled “a very critical case” in Al-Yamoun involving a teenager, before pronouncing him dead.
The ministry later said three people died in the village of Kafr Malik in the south of the territory in an “attack” by settlers.
In a statement it reported “three martyrs and seven injuries (including one critical) as a result of the settlers’ attack.” It did not identify those killed.
The Red Crescent earlier reported that a 30-year-old man suffered a “serious head injury” in Kafr Malik, northeast of Ramallah.
An Israeli army spokesperson said in a statement that forces intervened in Kafr Malik in the evening after “dozens of Israeli civilians set fire to property” there, which led to stone-throwing by Palestinians and Israelis.
“IDF and police forces were dispatched to the area and acted to disperse the friction,” it said.
“Subsequently, several terrorists opened fire from within the village and threw stones at the forces, who responded with live fire toward the source of the shooting and the stone-throwers,” it added.
“Hits were identified, and it appears that there are several wounded and fatalities.”
Stone-throwing lightly injured an IDF officer and five Israelis were arrested, the IDF added.
Reacting to the reports, Palestinian Vice President Hussein Al-Sheikh accused settlers of acting “under the protection of the Israeli army.”
“We call on the international community to urgently intervene to protect our Palestinian people,” he added, in a message on X.
The Al-Yamoun incident marked the second time a teenager has been reported killed in the West Bank in two days.
On Monday, the health ministry said Israeli fire killed a 13-year-old it identified as Ammar Hamayel, also in Kafr Malik.
Earlier this month, the army confirmed it had killed a 14-year-old who threw rocks in the town of Sinjil.
In a similar incident in April, a teenager who held US citizenship was shot dead in the neighboring town of Turmus Ayya. The Israeli military said it had killed a “terrorist” who threw rocks at cars.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, and violence in the territory has soared since the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 that triggered the Gaza war.
Since then, Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 941 Palestinians, including many militants, according to the health ministry.
Over the same period, at least 35 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during Israeli military operations, according to Israeli figures.
Assad-era air force officer under EU, UK sanctions
DAMASCUS: Syria’s Interior Ministry said on Wednesday a former air force officer who is under British and EU sanctions had been detained, the latest such arrest announcement since longtime ruler Bashar Assad’s ouster.
Authorities in the Harasta area outside Damascus “arrested the criminal pilot Maj. Gen. Meezar Sawan,” the ministry said in a statement.
It said he held several positions including commanding the 20th air force division at a military airport outside the capital.
“He is considered to be involved in issuing orders for warplanes to bomb areas revolting against the former regime” in the Ghouta areas, the statement said, referring to former rebel strongholds outside Damascus that were pounded during Syria’s civil war.
Sawan was transferred to the counter-terrorism department for further investigation, it said.
The EU and UK sanctions lists also identify Sawan, born in 1954, as commander of the Syrian air force’s 20th division.
According to the EU, he was “in post after May 2011,” the year Syria’s conflict erupted with Assad’s brutal repression of anti-government protests.
“As a senior officer in the Syrian air force he is responsible for the violent repression of the civilian population including attacks against civilian areas by aircraft operating from air bases under the control of the 20th Division,” the EU listing adds.
Since opposition forces ousted Assad in December, the new authorities have occasionally announced the arrest of former security and other officials.
This month, authorities arrested Wassim Assad, a cousin of the longtime ruler, in one of the most high-profile arrests so far.
According to Syria observers, many high-ranking officials fled the country after Assad’s fall.
Syria crackdown prevented further Daesh terror attacks
- Security forces raid terrorist hideouts, seizing weapons and explosive caches
DAMASCUS: The sleeper cell behind a deadly church bombing near Damascus belonged to the Daesh group, which had plans to target a Shiite shrine in a similar attack, Syria’s Interior Ministry spokesperson said on Tuesday.
Sunday’s attack on the Mar Elias Church killed at least 25 people.
The attack was the first of its kind in the Syrian Arab Republic in years, and comes as Damascus is trying to win the support of the country’s minorities.
Noureddine Al-Baba told journalists a second attacker was caught on Monday on his way to target a Shiite shrine in the Sayyida Zeinab suburb in Damascus, where many religious sites are located.
Al-Baba said security forces also thwarted a third operation, where an attacker on a motorbike was going to target a crowded gathering in the capital.
“We raided Daesh hideouts, seizing weapons and explosive caches,” said Al-Baba, who said security forces were able to reach the sleeper cell’s leader after interrogating the second attacker.
He said the church bomber was not Syrian but did not give details.
Al-Baba said cell leader Mohammad Abdelillah Al-Jumaili was a “Daesh leader” responsible for recruiting extremists from the sprawling Al-Hol camp in north-eastern Syria to conduct attacks.
Tens of thousands of Daesh militants and their families from around the world live in Al-Hol, held by Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. The SDF condemned the attack on Sunday.
Meanwhile, funerals were held for the victims of the church bombing at the Church of the Holy Cross in Damascus. Church bells rang and women ululated as men walked through the weeping crowds carrying white coffins.
The crowds cheered as the clergy honored the victims as martyrs.
Dima Beshara, 40, who lost her cousin Emil, 38, and seven other family members in the attack said Syria has always enjoyed religious coexistence and that she was among many from all sects who celebrated the downfall of ousted leader Bashar Assad in December.
“What did they do wrong? They went to the house of God to pray?” Beshara said at the graveyard.
“Am I supposed to be scared every time I want to go and pray?” She fears for her life and those of her loved ones, who regularly attend church for prayers, weddings and funerals.
“We love everyone. We don’t have a problem with anyone. But we hope that they love us in return,” she said.
Syria’s top Christian leader said at the funeral for victims that President Ahmad Al-Sharaa’s government bore responsibility for not protecting minorities and his condolences were insufficient.
“With love and with all due respect, Mr. President, you spoke yesterday by phone ... to express your condolences. That is not enough for us,” the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, John (X) Yazigi, said at the funeral, drawing applause.
“We are grateful for the phone call. But the crime that took place is a little bigger than that.”
The US State Department condemned what its spokesperson Tammy Bruce described as “a brutal and cowardly attack” and called on the Syrian government to hold all perpetrators of violence accountable.
She said Washington continued to support the Syrian government “as it fights against forces seeking to create instability and fear in their country and in the broader region.”
Yazigi said the government must prioritize protection for all.
“What is important to me — and I will say it — is that the government bears responsibility in full,” Yazigi said.
Hundreds were at the service in the nearby Church of the Holy Cross to bury nine of the victims, whose bodies were placed in simple white coffins adorned with white flowers.
Social Affairs Minister Hind Kabawat — the only Christian and only woman in Syria’s new government — attended.
